The new school year, 2023/2024, is due to begin on Monday, 4th September, 2023. As far as the new Albena Lake Hodge Comprehensive School facility in the Quarter is concerned, it will not be ready for a fully-fledged opening on that date, due to finishing touches still in progress.
It was officially promised a few months ago that the school would be ready to open in time for the new school year, and work was feverishly progressing to meet this deadline. However, due to the incompleteness of the preparatory work, only a limited number of students will be accommodated at the school.
As of September 4th, only Forms 5 and 6 will be accommodated, while work continues to bring the facility to a complete state of readiness.
In speaking about the opening at the last Government Press Conference on Monday 21st August, 2023, the Honorable Minister of Education, Miss Dee-Ann Kentish-Rogers said, “I know that there are a number of questions related to the opening of school, but I just want to indicate to the public that when school opens on September 4th, Forms 1 and 2 will be still operating from Campus B facility. Forms 3 and 4 will be returning to school virtually, online, from September 4th to September 16th. All of this is in order to ensure that all of the requisite work is completed in order to accommodate the entire school population.”
The Minister said that she monitors the site daily to note the progress. She checks in with the Contractor and the Project Manager regularly to ensure that the students can be safely moved into the school. “This phased approach is a provisional plan that is being developed at the moment,” she said.
Meanwhile, the Honourable Minister of Finance and Premier, Dr. Ellis Webster, reported that another Supplementary Budget was approved in Executive Council and has been presented to the UK for verification.
Included in this new supplementary budget is an amount of EC$4,000,000 that is, in essence, earmarked to complete Phase 1 of the Albena Lake-Hodge Comprehensive School. This EC$4,000,000 is in addition to the EC$10,000,000 which was requested earlier this year and expended on the school project.
