Every child should have a tablet

4 years ago

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Minister of Education, Youth and Information, Fayval Williams, says the Government is committed to ensuring that students across the island are equipped with a technology device regardless of socioeconomic circumstance.


“The education sector, and Jamaica by extension, is on a digital journey. This journey is to ensure that all our students have the skills to operate in the 21st century. It begins by ensuring that all of our students from across Jamaica, wherever they are, whatever their socioeconomic standing, that they have a device, whether a tablet or a laptop,” she noted.


The Minister was addressing a ceremony for the handover of tablets by Sandals Foundation to students of the Ocho Rios Primary School, held at the school grounds last Friday.
Minister Williams said that while students who are on the Programme of Advancement Through Health and Education (PATH) are being prioritised, the Government is cognizant that there are other children, from needy families, who need help.
She said it is against this background that the Ministry is appealing to members of the private sector, including overseas Jamaicans, to support the ‘One Tablet or One Laptop per Child’ Initiative.


“This initiative, of one tablet per child, is a call to corporate Jamaica or wherever you are, to come and assist us so we can achieve this dream,” she noted.


The Ministry, through e-Learning Jamaica (e-LJam), is currently distributing 40,000 devices to PATH students from grades four to six under the Tablets in Schools Programme.
The next set of distribution will be for high-school students in grades 10 to 13, then those in grades seven to nine.