…movement signalled on regional accreditation body
Chairman of the CARICOM Council for Human and Social Development (COHSOD), Shaik Baksh, declared the three days of discussions on a wide range of issues affecting the Caribbean region and CARICOM  have not been in vain.
He spoke at a closing press conference yesterday held at the Pegasus Hotel. “Overall, the outcome of this COHSOD has been a productive one. We’ve dealt with a wide range of issues, and commencing with discussion on regional tertiary education system on which a decision was taken to establish a technical working group to provide an action plan for achieving a regional tertiary education council… to bring some harmony to what has been done with tertiary education in the region as a whole; issues such as accreditation and quality control, accountability and so on,” he said.
The Chairman said that the technical working group will report to COHSOD as early as April 2011.
He said that COHSOD also discussed the status of the Regional Accreditation Body, which has been on the books for some time. “It was decided that a briefing paper be prepared for member states so that it can move forward. This will have to be put to the Cabinet of the member states so that we can bring them on board so that we could have the regional accreditation council ratified by all states,” he said.
He said that a number of ideas looking at alternative pathways of technical and vocational education to retain boys in the education system were shared. They also looked at home and school factors that might be responsible for this trend and at ways to ensure that this is turned around.
“It was agreed that the summary results of the study will be widely disseminated to a cross section of stakeholders so as to inform them of the study which has been carried out,” he said.
Baksh said too the early childhood education was also looked at and an important decision was taken to urge member states to increase access by 2015 for early childhood services in all countries to a minimum of 30 percent for the birth to two years age group, and 100 percent from the age group three to five , and to provide for training of teachers.
Baksh, also Guyana’s Minister of Education, said that the Caribbean Examinations Council presented a paper on CXC innovation: the driver of education reform. He said that part of this innovation is the revamping and systematisation of school-based assessments, expanding the range of certification subject areas and efforts at achieving cost-effectiveness in programme delivery and resource mobilisation. He said that this was a paper that was well received by COHSOD and “we commended the CXC body for moving in this direction.”

The meeting, in discussing the main findings of the Report on the Situation of Youth in the Caribbean conducted by the CCYD, paid particular attention to the issues related to youth employment and employability and their implications for the imperative of relevance in education. 
COHSOD received a presentation on the Regional ICT for Development Strategy and discussed its implications for advancing the education agenda, particularly in the areas of equity and increased access to quality and relevant education in the knowledge economy; and further requested the Secretariat to begin work on defining the use of ICT in Education. According to CARICOM, a preliminary report should be completed by October 2011.
The meeting received an update from the Caribbean Knowledge Learning Network (CKLN) on the Network – C@ribNET – that would link all tertiary institutions within the Caribbean.  CARICOM, in a statement, noted that the first eight countries would be connected by the first quarter of 2011.
COHSOD noted with concern the high rate of obesity in the Caribbean and recognised the need for interventions primarily in behaviour change communication and in sharing best practices.
According to CARICOM, COHSOD also noted the critical link between education and food and nutrition security, and gave support to the design of food service operations in schools, based on structured systems and standards. It was further agreed that a focal point / team from within the education sectors would be nominated to support the implementation of the Regional Policy on Food and Nutrition.