During that press conference, the Chairman of the Caribbean Examinations Council also discussed the very difficult transition that nations have had to make, to continue educating the world's children while the COVID-19 pandemic rages on.
He said that he did some research on how online learning has been going within the Caribbean region. And, from his assessment, affordable access to the internet is a big problem for CARICOM nations. Here are his comments on that topic:
Sir Harry Beckles - Chairman, Caribbean Examinations Council "One of the things that I certainly did was to collect the data from across the region, data issued by the internet providers, the companies that make this provision, to get a sense of the density, the density of internet access per country. And, the variation is really quite considerable. The variation is not only across countries. It's actually within countries, but sufficient - I think we can say that this COVID really did challenge all educational institutions. The university was faced with a similar challenge, colleges, the examining institution, the organization that is CXC. I know that the governments, the ministers of education, were so keen to make sure that it was good coverage, not only between town and country but across the countryside where, in many countries, it is not as developed as in the urban situations. And, it has become a major challenge. This digital access, the digital divide has become a major challenge in our region. All of us in the business of examining, teaching, learning our students, and making sure there is equity, it is a problem. We have a problem with the digital divide. The statistical data might not be relevant at this stage, just to say that we have a problem, and we're trying to work with it, country by country. CXC can only deliver a product with efficiency, if the customer, which is the students and the countries, if they have access to online learning, especially in this COVID context."
But, the pandemic did have one positive effect on the CXC. It has pushed them to make technological upgrades to the way they conduct business. Here's the conversation on that topic:
Reporter "Would you say that that COVID, to some extent, was a blessing in disguise for the CXC?"
Sir Harry Beckles - Chairman, Caribbean Examinations Council "Well, the COVID is really forcing us to do many things that we have always wanted to do. We have always wanted to embrace the technology much more aggressively, in respect of teaching and learning, and governance administration, improving efficiency, reducing the cost. So, this is something that we've always wanted to do, but we have tended to do this rather slowly. But, COVID has forced us into, like it or not, get on with it. And this is precisely what is happening. So, from that point of view, an effect has been to drive us deeper into the embrace and the use of technology."
