Rashaed Esson

Staff Writer

#China, August 5, 2023 – Cuba and China have made new ties to enhanced its cooperation in higher education. This comes as new cooperation agreements were signed with Chinese counterparts during a visit to China by Miriam Nicado García, rector of the University of Havana.

This development is in-line with Garcia’s aim, that is to expand collaboration between the Universities of the two countries as she expressed in an interview with Prensa Latina.

While in China, she took part in the Global Forum of University Presidents which focused on the debate on the work of universities after Covid-19 as well as the challenges to bring about innovation, science and technology in the development of countries.

Additionally, she had talks with Zhou Zuoyu, vice president of the Beijing Pedagogical University of humanities and social sciences, which has a high development in scientific and technological innovation.

As she continues her agenda, Nicado will take part in other meetings with the universities of Hebei and Liaocheng which can potentially lead more development.

“We have the projection of creating joint centers and colleges with the aim of teaching common careers in China with ours (…),” she said.

The Forum is a wide-reaching international academic conference held in recent years by China’s higher education circles.  It’s aim is to building a platform for exchange and dialogue for the presidents of the world’s top universities.

Rashaed Esson

Staff Writer

#Guyana, July 12, 2023 – Spanish will be made a compulsory subject in schools throughout Guyana come September, 2023; this was announced by the President of Guyana on Wednesday July 12^th; it comes as the country is addressing a shortage of nurses by turning to Cuba.

To aid in a successful transition of this new development, Dr Irfaan Ali, President, at a news conference revealed to reporters that his administration is examining the possibility of hiring Spanish teachers from overseas.

Additionally, he said he is working on a full assessment of the number of local teachers to see who is capable of effectively teaching the subject. He expressed that even though there is capacity at the secondary level, he wants students at grade four or five to start taking Spanish classes.

Ali also highlighted that the Government is in communication with “bilateral partners to loan human resources” in the transition period just until Guyanese teachers can take the lead across the country to teach the subject.

It is not just students who are subject to learning Spanish. Ali pointed out that he also will have ministers of government take classes and he hopes the private sector will do the same.

The opportunity to learn Spanish is also being extended to the general public since the Government is thinking of developing an online platform for citizens who want to learn the language, according to Ali, who expressed he regrets not having the opportunity to further pursue the subject in secondary school as he had to drop it.

Learning a foreign language will help students be more marketable in the working world as pointed out by Ali.

Guyana is currently dealing with a shortage of nurses and so, Ali announced the Government was looking to Havana to help tackle the issue.

Ali spoke on Wednesday with Jorge Francisco Soberón, the Cuban AmSobering, to Guyana in efforts to acquire Cuban nurses to enter the Guyanese system to help fill the gap due to the immediate shortage.

“The medium and long-term is to train and retrain and train more than the capacity that we need according to,” said the president.

For context, nationally, the public health sector has a shortage of at least 1,300 nurses and that’s only a portion of the shortage as the entire Caribbean is struggling with the shortage in not just nurses but other health workers.

By Deandrea Hamilton and Dana Malcolm 

Editorial Staff

June 22, 2023 – The Caribbean Examinations Council will proceed with examinations as normal for all regions; an announcement which had been anticipated after as many as nine examination papers had reportedly been stolen from an exam centre in Jamaica.

The CXC candidates had been in a state of limbo, but a meeting held last Thursday June 15 with regional stakeholders affirmed the next step, which would be to carry out the examinations as scheduled.

The fireproof safe containing exams had been stolen on June 14 and contained both completed papers and the questions to nine exams yet to be administered region wide.

Students, teachers and parents had to wait for the outcome of an investigation into the issue before finding out whether exams would be pushed back. The Council on June 16 said with no evidence that the stolen safe had been compromised the dates for exams will continue as scheduled.

This was the second time the 2023 examination papers suffered some breach.  The first in May, also in Jamaica, was a reported leak of Mathematics Paper 2 ahead of the exam that same day.

Interestingly now, the Council has issued a new notice with there being a potential for some examination candidates to be delayed in testing; this time though, the threat is a natural disaster.  Tropical Storm Bret has caused some warnings to be issued in the lesser Antilles which includes Barbados, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Grenada and Dominica.

The National Hurricane Center, in its 11 p.m. advisory (Wednesday June 21) informed that a Tropical Storm Warning in in effect for: Dominica, St. Lucia and Martinique.  A Tropical Storm Watch is in effect for: Barbados and St. Vincent and the Grenadines

Advice to students sitting the exams is to prepare to be present for their CXCs unless otherwise instructed by their country’s disaster preparedness office.