The OECS Education Strategy to 2010
Errol Miller, Didacus Jules and Leton Thomas. OECS Reform Unit, OECS Secretariat. Funded by The Department for International Development Caribbean DFID. December 2000
Pillars for Partnership and Progress is the OECS long-term education reform strategy for the period 2000 to 2010. It follows on directly from Foundation for the Future which was the first stage of the education reform strategy for the sub-region. As such Pillars for Partnership and Progress is the second stage of the reform of education in the OECS. The metaphor of pillars builds out on the metaphor of foundation, assuming that the latter had been laid.
Pillars for Partnership and Progress was designed and developed after a comprehensive assessment of Foundation for the Future using an evaluation framework prescribed by DFIDC in which participants from all nine countries of the OECS assessed what had been achieved in implementing the strategies of Foundation for the Future in their country. The assessment and evaluation exercise of Foundation for the Future were led and coordinated by Miller, Jules, and Thomas who then proceeded to lead the process for the development of Pillars for Partnership and Progress.
Essentially Pillars for Partnership and Progress adopts the nine strategic areas of Foundation for the Future and adds other two areas: information and communication technologies and urgent social imperatives. Urgent societal imperatives include education strategies that address natural disasters, health promoting schools, gender equity, retaining boys in schools and partnership as the prescribed modality of implementation. In total Pillars for Partnership and Progress proposed 77 strategies grouped into eleven strategic areas.