Development of Education in the Caribbean

1. Development of Education in the Caribbean

2. Pre - Emancipation • Pre-Emancipation:•    Education limited to whites and males specifically•    Female education was limited to domestic science (whites)•    No formal education (in reading, writing and numeric) for the enslaved.

3. Post - Emancipation •    Emergence of limited formal education for the newly freed. Usually initiated by the missionary societies. •    State funded educational institutions were limited during the immediate post-emancipation era. Economic loss from declining sugar profits was blamed for this inadequacy.   •    In Jamaica, the 1898 Lumb Report recommended that both boys and girls should be taught agriculture science “in such a manner as to overcome the prevalent distaste for these pursuits so essential to the economic standards of Jamaica and its citizens”. (Leo-Rhynie, 1997) Blacks had developed a dislike for agricultural enterprise and preferred education in areas lending to ‘office work’.

4. 1900 Political Independence •    Nationalist politicians understood that education was essential to national progress and productivity. National policies were implemented to improve the quality and increase opportunity for education amongst the masses. •    1950 saw the development of the first regional university amongst the British West Indies – the University of the West Indies, with three campuses spread throughout the region, located at Mona Jamaica, Cave hill Barbados and St Augustine Trinidad. • For the first time in the history of the BWI, Anglophone students desirous of pursuing university education had the option of obtaining their Bachelor degree within the region.