Primary, high school students will get laptops under NEXTGEN Labour: Dr Drew

The St Kitts-Nevis Labour Party (SKNLP) candidate for St Christopher 8, Dr Terrance Drew has given an assurance that the NEXTGEN Labour Party administration will reinstate the one-to-one lap top programme for Grade 5 students entering the high school as well as all high schools in the Federation.

"Young people must have easy access to information technology and all must condemn the Timothy Harris PLP/CCM/PAM coalition for stopping the programme when they assumed office in 2015. We must help the parents who cannot afford to purchase laptops or desktop computers. Our students should no longer have to go by neighbours to do or complete assignments or to research,” said Dr. Drew, who viewed the one-to-one lap top programme which was funded jointly by the Government of the Republic of China (Taiwan) and the St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Government, "as removing a barrier to attaining a sound education and providing an equal opportunity for all students."

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education, Hon Shawn Richards as recently as Thursday said that the one-to-one lap top programme was a waste of time and resources and teachers were not capable of training the students how to use the laptops as they themselves were not trained.

"Our students were ahead of teachers and were seen showing teachers how to use the laptops," said a former student. "It increased teacher-student relation,"

Shawn Richards' statement Thursday that students were seen outside an establishment seeking Wifi connection was criticized by Florida-based Nevisian Ivor Henry.

"Mr educator, rather than updating and providing the students with easier WiFi access, instead you agreed with a set of boneheads to abandon the use and continued issuance of the said laptops. It’s like we’ve gone pass horse and buggy days. We are up to engine transportation but short on gas money. Instead of helping to acquire gas money you and the backward thinking administrators think it’s best to go back to horse and buggy days. And up to now we have not heard one sensible reason why the old BHS building cannot be demolished and a brand new state of the art school be erected on the same site? If you think education is expensive, try ignorance," Henry, a former police officer posted on his FaceBook account on Friday.

Dr Drew said it must be recognized that a computer literate and technological society is essential and the curtailment of the programme by the Harris Government has set our young people back.

All high school students from Forms 2 to 5 received laptops prior to September 2013. In November 2014, just over 1,500 new Dell 3340 laptops were distributed to all Form 1 students in private and public secondary schools in both St. Kitts and Nevis.