‘School Safety Policy remains priority of Education Ministry’

While the new School Safety Policy remains a priority for the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information, Portfolio Minister Dr Dana Morris Dixon has assured that several other initiatives that are geared towards protecting students and staff are in place at public schools nationally.

She pointed to a current collaboration between the ministry and the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF) with having police officers present in some schools.

"What we see happening in our schools is really a reflection of what we see happening in our broader society, and it is being brought into the school environment, and we going to have to deal with it on multiple fronts," said the minister at Wednesday's post-Cabinet press briefing.

She said this is why the ministry is updating the policy and "prioritising" it to be completed by the end of the month.

Morris Dixon first announced a review of the policy after the November 15 shooting death of a bus driver on the compound of Holmwood Technical High School in Christiana, Manchester.

Sometime after that incident, a parent was shot by gunmen outside the gates of Rosseau Primary School in St Andrew.

Morris Dixon said measures are also being put in place relative to assisting persons with parenting skills, as well as the psychosocial elements that are impacting children's behaviour.

"A lot of our children are coming to school traumatised. They have trauma in their homes, they have trauma in their communities, and so it's not just about teaching them when they come to school.

"We're also having to think about their 'psyche', and giving counselling, and so we are, as the ministry, having to be looking at how we have more guidance counsellors, how we do have more of those types of initiatives (to assist our children)," said Morris Dixon.

To that end, she pointed to security in schools being "a very multi-layered issue" that the ministry has to contend with.

In addition to the JCF, Morris Dixon said the Education Ministry is looking at what she called "social parts of the Government" that can support it in providing various relevant services to families and children nationally.