Truancy officials of the Ministry of Education and Technical and Vocational Training conducted of walkabout recently to locate children who are missing from school. They were accompanied by officials of Urban Renewal.
Chief School Attendance Officer Anzlo Strachan said, “I’ve seen a few kids in the street, right, but the walkabout is important because when you go through side corners and you call out to people you discover that kids are actually inside these houses and more children than expected.”
According to Strachan, some of the reasons given for children not attending school are the lack of uniforms and immunization among other things.
Acting Director of Education Dominique McCartney Russel revealed that school attendance stands at 91%. She also said, “we are putting on now a pilot program that will allow us to provide breakfast for those children who are chronically absent in some of our schools. And that idea is that their parents don’t have to search or look for lunch or breakfast. They can come to school, we meet that need, feed that brain, feed the body and then of course we want to feed them with the educational opportunities.”
