The Organization of American States (OAS) is partnering with the Ministry of Education, through it Curriculum Development Unit, to fund a Reading Assessment Project in the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis. The project is designed to evaluate the level of reading skills throughout the primary schools in both St. Kitts and Nevis as well as to strengthen the Ministry of Education’s efforts in focusing attention where it is most required. Moreover, the project is an outgrowth from the Ministry of Education White Paper that has established reading as the basis for all subjects across the board. In this connection, the White Paper emphasized that the teaching of reading would continue to receive a high level of attention through quality teacher training that would identify weak readers. This OAS sponsored project will give support to the implementation of reading intervention strategies that will help all children transferring from the Grades 5 and 6 at the primary level to the secondary level function at the appropriate reading level.
At a workshop held on Tuesday, October 27, 2009, designed specifically for Principals of Primary Schools in St. Kitts, the OAS Representative, Mr. Starret Greene, expressed his organization’s delight in partnering with the Ministry of Education in the implementation of the project. The OAS diplomat said that his organization remained fully committed to working with the Federal Government in building an education system that would meet the needs of all our children and relevant to the developmental priorities of St. Kitts and Nevis. He remarked that the OAS was pleased to be working with educators to prepare this generation of young men and women to make their various contributions to nation building, not only here in St. Kitts and Nevis but also in our region and in the world at large.
Mr. Osmond Petty, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education officially declared the workshop opened at the Curriculum Development Unit.
The project is funded through the OAS Special Multilateral Fund of the Inter-American Council for Integral Development.
