PHILIPSBURG, Sint Maarten – Remarks Drs. Rodolphe E. Samuel, Minister of Education, Culture, Youth & Sport – Co-host of the forum and incoming chair of the CSSI.
Opening Session
As incoming chair of the Caribbean Safe School Initiative, and in my capacity as co-host of this forum and Minister of Education, Culture Youth & Sport, I bring you greetings from St. Maarten. COVID-19 and the increasing hazards that our region has been challenged with, substantiates the need for us to continue working as islands, countries and as a region on comprehensive school safety.
In the aftermath of Hurricane Irma in 2017, MECYS was catalyzed to make a number of strides toward ensuring education sector resilience. In July 2018 MECYS installed the Safety & Emergency Management Committee (SEMC). The SEMC was commissioned to adapt the Comprehensive School Safety Framework at the national level; set up plans and strategies for safety and emergency management; continuous disaster preparedness and maintenance; and crisis management. That same year, we began the consultative process on the school safety Roadmap. We trained stakeholders on assessing hazards in schools; safety & Emergency Response guidelines were approved and schools began to work on their school safety & emergency plans. In 2019, safety & Emergency teams were installed in each school; school safety material was distributed to schools, school evacuation procedures were drafted and work began on the Safety Ambassadors Program for elementary schools.
St. Maarten signed on to the Antigua & Barbuda Declaration in April 2019 because we are committed to disaster risk management in our education sector and that commitment is one that we all share. By April 2020, our very recent commitment to the Antigua & Barbuda Declaration and progress made in the area of school safety were quickly tested as we faced the specter of another rapid onset that was this time invisible, insidious, persistent and just as crippling.
COVID-19, which very much like Irma has resulted in devastating impacts to all our sectors, has given us further pause to review our definition and understanding of risk. We have learnt that risk is as much about the unknown as it is about the known.
As Ministries of Education, we can only start to tackle the interconnected nature of systemic risk by becoming connected ourselves. We must do this despite territorial and political boundaries, across sectors and regardless of language differences. The recent and ongoing events have taught us if nothing else that our experiences are shared, that we can learn from each other and that none of us want to be caught off guard. Let us use the opportunity presented by the Virtual Pre-Ministerial Forum on Safe Schools to share our experiences and set the basis for the continued advancement of the school safety agenda in the Caribbean through the CSSI.
The genius of this virtual forum is that it allows all stakeholders to participate and in so doing, builds stronger collaboration among the Ministries of Education in the Caribbean with relevant private sector entities, non-governmental organizations as well as other regional and international entities.
The Third Ministerial Forum will be hosted by St. Maarten and will be defined by you the ministers, based on your national and regional priorities for action and dialogue for the remainder of 2021. It is our intention that this virtual forum will serve as the necessary catalyst. We ask you to ensure the participation of your Permanent Secretaries and School Safety Focal Points, during the entirety of the forum.
I wish to formally recognize the partners who have worked together to make this event possible. As incoming chair of the Regional Safe School Working Group and the CSSI, I fully endorse this Virtual Forum. We must continue to make progress in the area of school safety as the sustainability of our nations depend on it.
