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In an article published in the June 2023 issue of the newsletter of the Caribbean Centre for Educational Planning, titled ” Chat GPT – Incremental or Exponential Revolution in Artificial Intelligence” I incipiently argue that the seeming awe with which Chat GPT was being greeted as some amazing new stuff, reflected a misreading of the […]

The American people have spoken and, in my view, have spoken decisively in choosing Donald Trump as their  47th president.  Trump’s victory has come as a shock to many, while others are saying that it was expected.  But many analysts who were moved by, what they saw as, the flawless roll out of the Harris-Walz campaign are now questioning

By Dr Marsha Black-Chen The Importance of Dialogue The problem of low mathematics performance among students across all levels of the Caribbean education system has been a systemic problem, and some may say it has been so for generations. The understanding is that being proficient at math ultimately leads to an understanding of life. Hom

The data on homicides in the Caribbean, in 2023, as reported by the Statista Research Department, (a source that is rated as highly trustworthy by several entities) showed Jamaica with the highest rate of murder per capita, at 60.9 per 100,000.  Statista, which shows data on countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, locates Ecuador at

Dervin Cochrane Since 2020, Jamaica’s performance in mathematics has had a varying trend. The performance ranged from 36 % to 47.3% at its highest point. Below is an illustration of this in Figure 1. Jamaica’s pass percentage was 38.2% in 2020, during a time when Covid-19 was wreaking havoc across the world with lockdowns and the

A few weeks ago, I made a pronouncement on the recent Primary Exit Profile (PEP) and Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) results that highlighted significant deficit in learning and mastery at these two levels particularly in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM)-based subjects.  One of the recommendations is to have teachers’ colleges revisit how their teachers are trained for

The announcement of the appointment of Jamaica’s Finance Minister, Dr. Nigel Clarke, as Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, with effect from October 30, 2024, has triggered an avalanche of public commentary and discussion.  One of the positions highlighted is the question of whether the IMF has changed from what it was forty,

The educational landscape is a truly dynamic space; every so often, a new concept, theory or approach becomes the new “buzzword”. Maslow and Bloom seem to have lost the traction they have held for quite some time and; fresh in the minds of stakeholders in education are: 5Cs, 4Es, STEM/STEAM/STREAM. The 5Cs refer to  Critical

The Government of Jamaica had indicated it would introduce the Sixth Form Pathway Programme that would seek to improve the educational outcomes of many high school leavers. By engaging in courses to make themselves more marketable, school leavers through pursuing CXC/City and Guilds subjects, skill based subjects, this initiative also contributes to the improvement of

Effective leadership in every sphere requires the existence of trust.  A leader’s believability and the willingness of others to carry out instructions and act in the organization’s best interests, even in the absence of explicit situational instructions, are all dependent on trust between the leader and those he or she leads.  The ability of members