Published as the first Chapter and titled: Commonwealth Caribbean Education in the Global Context: Educational Reform in Independent Jamaica. In Educational Reform in the Commonwealth Caribbean, (1999) Errol Miller Editor, INTERAMER 54 Educational Series. Organisation of American States, Washington D. C. Pp 3-23

This publication is the first Chapter of the Book titled Educational Reform in the Commonwealth Caribbean which deals with reform measures introduced in different countries of the Commonwealth Caribbean in the last decade of the twentieth century. In setting the stage for the description and discussion of these reforms this publication points out that several of the policy prescriptions for the education of the New Right has already been implemented in the Commonwealth Caribbean and that most of the characteristics used to define education in the developing countries do not apply to the Commonwealth Caribbean. Accordingly, education reform in the last decade of the twentieth century has drawn their informing ideas from the unique imperatives of this sub-region. To account for these unique imperatives this Chapter shows that Commonwealth Caribbean has been part of the Western system of education for over 350 years and therefore tracing its development through the Protestant ideas that informed the genesis of education during slavery, the Denominational system with state support and the State system with denominational management that emerged in the following emancipation but during the colonial period and the national systems of education that have been established in the post-independence period prior to the final decade of the twentieth century.