Providenciales, The Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) donated 88 laptop computers to the Ministry of Education, Youth, Culture and Library Services in the Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI). The computers were presented to the Ministry at a handing over ceremony held at the Premier’s Office in Providenciales on October 31, 2018.
The donation was made possible through the CDEMA Legacy Project initiative, which mobilizes finances to support recovery in impacted Participating States. The aim of the Legacy Project is to improve the socio-economic conditions of the most vulnerable persons in the most adversely affected areas and it is mainly facilitated by the collective contributions of individual, corporate, national, regional and international donors.
A donation of USD $70,000 was provided to assist in the development of the Education Management Information System (EMIS) post Hurricanes Irma and Maria through the contribution of the 88 computers to the Ministry of Education in the TCI.
In offering thanks to CDEMA and its donors, Honorable Karen Malcolm, Minister of Education, Youth, Culture and Library Services, said that one of the targets outlined in the Ministry’s Education Sector Plan is to build resilience in the education system to ensure business continuity. “Through the CDEMA Legacy Project funding, we are able to secure laptops to support teaching, learning and data entry into our EMIS. We are grateful for this extraordinary kindness of these 88 computers. This will help the Ministry of Education infrastructure to assist students with their education needs and teachers in their planning and delivery of the curriculum”.
In his remarks, Ronald Jackson, Executive Director of CDEMA said “This donation of computers forms part of the broader information and communication technology approach in implementing the Comprehensive Disaster Management (CDM) Strategy. Given the realities of future climate change impacts to the region, operational readiness for response and recovery are very important. We will have to re-imagine, rethink, re-engineer and emerge a more resilient society. The education sector has to be at the forefront of that thrust going forward”.
Acknowledging the progress of the ongoing recovery and rehabilitation work being done in the TCI since the events of September 2017, Mr. Jackson also reiterated the importance of institutionalising the recovery process throughout the region. “One of the things CDEMA is striving for in the next few years is the institutionalising of recovery processes within the Caribbean. We cannot continue to approach recovery in the region in the way we have in the past whereas the event happens and then we seek to set up institutions to drive that process. Successful recovery requires us to see this process as a part of the day to day operations of development planning and disaster risk reduction efforts in our Participating States”. (PR)
