By RICARDO WELLS

Tribune Staff Reporter

rwells@tribunemedia.net

PUBLIC schools in the northwest Bahamas will remain closed for the reminder of the week, with officials aiming to reassess repair efforts by Friday to decide a suitable return date for students.

The announcement came during a press conference held at the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology on Tuesday, where Education Minister Jerome Fitzgerald presented his ministry’s plan of action in the wake of Hurricane Matthew.

Mr Fitzgerald said teams from the ministry’s Physical Plan Unit have spent much of the last few days assessing public school campuses throughout New

Providence, Grand Bahama, North Andros and the Berry Islands - the areas hardest hit during the passage of the massive category four storm last week.

The Marathon MP indicated that those teams have been asked to provide a “detailed inspection” that would be used to help the ministry with its efforts to return students to the classroom.

Mr Fitzgerald said while the majority of schools “held up well,” some suffered extensive damage.

Referring to those in the latter category, Mr Fitzgerald said: “Realistically, the clean up will require days to complete. We will therefore use the remainder of this week to aggressively address the clean up and restoration efforts in all of New Providence, Grand Bahama and North Andros schools, along with the school at Lowe Sound. This is a mammoth task but our number one priority.”

According to education officials, those schools extensively damaged include C I Gibson High School in New Providence, Bartlett Hill and Lewis Yard Primary in Grand Bahama and the Lowe Sound Primary School in Andros.

“The extent of the damage at these schools will require medium to long term (work) and we are now in the process of making alternate arrangements for the administrators, staff and students of those schools to identify a suitable place to accommodate them in the interim,” Mr Fitzgerald said.

The Tribune understands that there was extensive damage to the roof of the C I Gibson School. At the two campuses in Grand Bahama, major flooding and exterior structural damage have rendered those properties unusable.

Additionally, the Lowe Sound Primary property has also sustained extensive structural and roofing damage.

Over in the Berry Islands, resumption of school has been pushed back due to the communication failure across that island, with officials expressing hope that all matters there could be resolved by this weekend.

Mr Fitzgerald said his ministry has no idea how much it is going to cost the government to carry out all the needed repairs. However, he said he would be in a better position to give a figure by Friday.

Education officials spent roughly $13 million on repairs throughout the country ahead of the start of the 2016 - 2017 academic school year.

During his address on Tuesday, Mr Fitzgerald implored building supply stores across the Bahamas to give priority to contractors being engaged by his office.

He said: “We will be mobilising contracts as soon as possible. The companies that we will engage for school repairs will be issued a letter with an official stamp by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology to be presented to building suppliers. We are making a special appeal to building suppliers to give preference to those in possession of one of these letters and that companies work with them to minimise long waits so that works can commence as quickly as possible.

“We also ask the general public to exercise patience and to be understanding of this process.”

Education officials have also announced plans to forgo the public school system’s scheduled mid-term break.

Mr Fitzgerald said his office made the decision after holding extensive discussions with the executives of the Bahamas Union of Teachers (BUT) and the Bahamas Education Managerial Union (BEMU).

Mr Fitzgerald said students have missed valuable instructional time due to the hurricane. He added that officials have moved to ensure that those missed days are made up.

“A decision has been made to forgo this month’s mid-term break and professional development days in the best interest of our students. I wish to repeat that there will be no mid-term break as was scheduled for the end of October,” Mr Fitzgerald said.

The Ministry of Education has mandated that all custodial staff return to work immediately to assist with repair efforts while teachers are due back at school on Thursday.

On Sunday, the Ministry of Education announced that schools in Abaco, Acklins, South Andros, Mangrove Cay, Bimini, Cat Island, Crooked Island, Eleuthera, Exuma, Inagua, Long Island, Mayaguana, Ragged Island, Rum Cay and San Salvador would have reopened yesterday.

In a statement released by officials at the time, the ministry urged students and teachers in the northwest Bahamas to remain at home until schools are ready for normal operation.

Further to that, officials emphasised that private and independent schools would decide when they were in the best position to resume operations and would give the public notice.

In a statement released yesterday, private school Queen’s College said its Village Road campus would not reopen for classes until Monday, October 17.