From The Ministry of Education

The Ministry of Education, Employment and Gender Affairs is pleased to release the Education Bill (2015) for public consultation. The Bill represents a milestone for education in the Cayman Islands.

Commenting on this process, Hon. Tara Rivers, Minister for Education said, “I am delighted that we have achieved this extremely important milestone within two years of taking office. This law will be the cornerstone for continued progress and development of education institutions and programmes in our country, and is necessary in order to work towards creating a centre of excellence in education. I would like to thank the dedicated team within the Ministry of Education for their hard work in producing this Bill. I would also like to encourage the public to read the bill and complete the online survey as your input is important to us and to this process. You are all key stakeholders, and your participation is crucial in ensuring that we have a world class education system for the benefit of our future generations and country as a whole.”

The current law, the Education Law (2010 Revision), is effectively over 30 years old, being largely the same as that originally enacted on 21st November 1983. As a consequence, provisions pertaining to a number of important priority areas for the government, including Early Childhood Education, Special Educational Needs, Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) and the National Curriculum are not covered in the operating law. As a result, there are a number of deficiencies in the current law, which regularly lead to technical breaches.

In order to cure these breaches and to bring the law in line with the Cayman Islands Constitution Order (2009) and other pertinent obligations, a significant revision to the Education Law has been necessary.

The Education Bill (2015) used the Education Modernisation Law (EML) that was passed in the Legislative Assembly in 2009 as a starting point. However, the Bill significantly enhances the scope of the EML while clarifying areas of ambiguity and concern that existed at the time the EML was passed.

This Bill represents the Government’s priority areas for education and provides a solid legislative framework for the areas to be supported by the Regulations, which will contain the operational details for each part of the bill.

Further amendments have also been made to bring the law in line with other relevant legislation passed since 2009, most notably the Children Law (2012).

Many of the provisions of the Bill are already followed as a matter of policy. These policies, developed as needs were identified, form the basis of secondary legislation (or regulations) to be drafted and adopted. The drafting of the regulations will be completed before the Bill is debated in the Legislative Assembly so that the Education Law (2015) can come into effect immediately once passed.

Given the importance of this legislation, the Ministry is looking to receive the public’s feedback. Members of the public are invited to review the Education Bill (2015) and complete the online survey on the Ministry of Education’s website: www.education.gov.ky.

The public consultation process is already underway, and will continue throughout the month of June. Various stakeholder groups will have the opportunity to participate; consultation sessions have already been arranged with teachers and specialist staff, principals and the Education Council. Further meetings are being confirmed with parents, PTA reps, and students. Internal stakeholders, including Ministry and DES staff are also being consulted. Opportunity for direct consultation with schools has also been arranged for Cayman Brac. The online feedback survey will be open for public input until the consultation period ends on June 30th, 2015.

Education Bill 2015 Summary Notes
June 2015

The Education Bill (2015) has been released for public consultation. A summary of the critical changes proposed in the Bill is listed, as follows.

• Part 2, Education Functions of Governmental Authority: changes were made to provide further clarity with respect to the specific role and functions of the Minister, and the role of the Education Council. Provisions were also made to allow for increasing opportunities for Private Public Partnerships in education.

• Part 3, Registration of Educational Institutions: the law also requires the registration of educational institutions. The law prohibits persons from owning, managing or participating in the management of a non-Government educational institution, unless the institution is registered.

• Part 4, School Attendance, Admissions and Access to Education: establishes the starting of school age as 5 years at the start of Year 1, which is currently enforced only through policy. The law also sets out the duty of parents or legal guardians of compulsory school age children to ensure that the children receive full-time education suitable to their requirements, either by attendance at school or by home-schooling. This part of the Bill also provides greater clarity on the right to home-school children, which is entirely absent from the current law.

• Part 5 National Curriculum and Educational Stage Assessment: empowers the Minister to establish a national curriculum in government schools and requires all programmes of study undertaken in the final stage of compulsory education to be accredited and recognised within the Cayman Islands National Qualifications Framework. There is further provision that the Minister may require studies relating to the history and culture of the Islands to be taught in all schools, both public and private, registered in the Islands.

• Part 6, Quality Assurance of Schools: establishes the Office of Education Quality Assurance, staffed by a Director and other officers. The Director or their designate is empowered to enter educational institutions, for the pursuance of the Director’s functions, and to examine and require the production of documents, for the purpose of quality assurance. The law further empowers the Minister to recommend to the Cabinet the closure of a school where there are immediate health or safety issues. The law also requires an annual report on the overall outcomes of quality assurances to be laid in the Legislative Assembly, in order to demonstrate that minimum standards are being met.

• Part 9, Technical and Vocational Education and Training, and Part 10, Post Compulsory Education and Training: now provide for TVET in the schools, and the establishment and regulation of post-compulsory education and training institutions, respectively.

• Part 11, Early Childhood Education: bring requirements in line with international best practice, including standardising the terminology to Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE). The law prohibits persons from operating an ECCE centre, unless the centre is registered. It also prohibits corporal punishment in any ECCE centre. Furthermore the law empowers the Cabinet to make regulations, among other things, prescribing standards with regard to safety, security, and sanitation for the efficient operation of an ECCE centre.

• Part 12, Discipline and Prohibition of Corporal Punishment in Schools: the law prohibits corporal punishment from being administered in all schools, and requires schools to have a written Student Behaviour and Discipline Policy that includes the disciplinary penalties to be applied and the procedures for the enforcement of the penalties. The law sets out the disciplinary authority of teachers and defines the circumstances in which reasonable force may be used, by specified persons, for the purpose of preventing a student from doing certain things (for example, committing an offence).

• Part 13, Special Educational Needs: the law defines students with special educational needs whose educational needs can only be satisfied by making exceptional provision in relation to the student. The law empowers the Minister to publish a Code of Practice on Special Educational Needs, and contains provisions governing the referral for assessment and the assessment of a student who is identified as having special educational needs. The law further provides for the outcome of the assessment to be set out in a statement of eligibility, which enables the relevant student to receive education in accordance with the statement.

Schools are required by the law to report on the extent of provision made in the school, for special educational needs. The law also contains provisions relating to the special educational needs of persons who are not of compulsory school age.

• Part 16, Miscellaneous: includes a section making it an offence to create a disturbance on school premises. This section also makes it a requirement for schools and ECCE centres to have a Child Protection Policy in compliance with the Children’s Law (2012 Revision).

END

IMAGE: www.frostburg.edu