Since its formation 1987, the University Council of Jamaica (UCJ) has not itself undertaken an institutional review of its processes and performance. With its mandate to accredit programmes and, more recently, institutions, the UCJ is expected to come under tighter scrutiny to ensure that its processes not only address the country’s education agenda but that the UCJ maintains its mandate and can be benchmarked against international standards of good practice. This paper reports on a brief survey undertaken among the staff and directors of the UCJ as well as institutions served by the UCJ.

Scholarship on Black males with learning disabilities continues to emphasize contributing factors relating to the achievement gap, their over-representation in special education programmes, and their high suspensions and low graduation rates. Although the demographics of classrooms are shifting to mirror diverse students, what remains an unknown in special education is why there is a persistent underrepresentation of Black as having learning disabilities, which leaves unanswered questions about proper identification and academic support services.

This paper investigates the impact of class attendance on student performance in an Intermediate Microeconomics class at the University of the West Indies (UWI), Mona. The UWI is the foremost and most prestigious university in the Anglophone Caribbean. It serves 18 countries and territories across the West Indies. No other study has explored this relationship in this area of the world. The author controls for a large number of student characteristics as well as the university characteristic class size.

This study examines student retention using Astin’s Input-Environment-Output model of assessment. Using administrative data, binomial logistic regression was performed to identify factors for successful student retention of first year, full-time, First-degree entrants at a Caribbean university. The odds of being retained were highest for scholarship recipients and female students. Living on campus was found to reduce one’s odds of being retained. The number of courses passed in high school and age were found to be statistically significant.

Recent comments that the school curriculum of Trinidad and Tobago is “culturally irrelevant” prompted this research project. The research was undertaken through a series of focus group discussions with community artists, curriculum officers and public figures interested in education, to explore the following issues:

Higher education has been positioned as an important contributor to development in low-income countries in the context of the knowledge economy. This paper assesses the potential for building sustainable higher education systems that can contribute to development in low-income countries. The premise of this paper is that developing countries cannot be researched in isolation.

Based on the Language Experience and Awareness approach, the Literacy 1–2–3 (L1–2–3) was designed for use in the Language Arts Window in a constructivist teaching/learning environment in Jamaican primary schools. Based on a review of studies on L1–2–3, this paper examined the extent to which characteristics of the innovation, local characteristics, and external factors impacted the effectiveness of its implementation.

This paper provides a comparative analysis of the writing performance in English of African heritage students in Birmingham, England and Kingston, Jamaica. The study explores the effects of language use on the written production of English among African heritage students in two geographical locations, Birmingham, England and Kingston, Jamaica. Particular attention is drawn to the effects of Jamaican Creole usage in Jamaica and Creole/Black British Talk in England, on the achievement levels of African heritage students.

To understand the significance of the online launch of this issue of the Journal of Education and Development in the Caribbean (JEDIC), one must understand its beginnings. Created by the late Professor Dennis Craig and Professor Emerita Zellynne Jennings-Craig, JEDIC was birthed out of a need to produce scholarly research by and for the Caribbean people, pertaining to both education and development. The first issue, published in June 1997 in Guyana, produced four articles, one book review and one thesis abstract.

The study involved hotel managers within Jamaica. The study focused  on applying the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to examine managers’ intentions to offer internships in Jamaica. The Specific objective of the study was to determine the salient beliefs that motivate hotel managers to offer internships to hospitality management/TVET students in Jamaica. Qualitative data were collected using individual interviews guided by interview protocol. Thirteen managers participated in the interviews. Data were analyzed and reported using content analysis and reporting.