Spearheaded by the Ministry of Education, Innovation, Gender Relations and Sustainable Development, the Education Quality Improvement Project (EQuIP), is on stream. Funding for the Project was secured from the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), through the Department of Economic Development, Transport and Civil Aviation.

The EQUIP Project is geared toward the enhancement of Saint Lucia’s education sector. The Policy on Education is centered around building a sector that is responsive to the diverse needs of Saint Lucia’s children, young people and adults, and developing graduate students capable of taking their place in the international economic and social community.

One component of the EQuIP initiative is enhancing the capacity to improve teacher quality, the relevance of education, and instructional effectiveness across the education sector. The project also focuses on enhancing the provisions for Special Needs Education in Saint Lucia.

In fulfilling these objectives short-term and degree-level continuing professional development training programmes are provided for teachers. Among those opportunities is the undertaking of Master’s programmes at the University of New Brunswick.

Minister for Education, Hon Dr. Gale Rigobert updated educators on the progress of the program at the term meeting with ministry officials. She indicated that due consideration is being given to the conversion of select secondary schools into sixth form schools.

The Government of Saint Lucia has received financing from the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) equivalent to the sum of sixteen million one hundred and ninety-two thousand US dollars (USD$16,192,000) toward the cost of implementing the EQuIP project.