BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Aug. 13, 2020– The People’s United Party (PUP) is charging full speed ahead to Belize’s 2020 general elections and has developed a new education policy as a part of their greater governing strategy entitled, “Plan Belize”.

On Wednesday, August 12, 2020, the party assembled members of the media to discuss this new education policy, which it has described as “Goal #1 of Plan Belize,” in spite of the great uncertainty surrounding the resumption of classes in the country.

The new policy was presented by former Minister of Education, Hon. Francis Fonseca, who stated that the plan was based on “Access, Equity and Quality,” which will be afforded to all Belizeans from the pre-school to the university levels.

This extensive blueprint for educational reform in the country focuses on eight key areas that fall under the following headings: Education Financing Reform; Early Childhood Education and Development; Leadership Administration and Teacher Training; Special Education; Higher Education and Development; Technical and Vocational Education; Technology: Transforming Belize; and Reform of the Ministry of Education.

According to Hon. Fonseca, focusing the party’s efforts on these key areas will assist the PUP in its endeavor to reduce administrative costs and bureaucracy in Belize’s current education system.

“Our goal is to reduce administrative costs and expenses from its current twelve percent of the education budget to five percent. This will yield savings of some twenty million dollars annually,” said Fonseca.

“Next, while we have 5,700 teachers, we have almost 1,200 non-teachers employed at the M.O.E. At present, this means that seventeen percent of the education workforce are not educators. We need less bureaucracy, and our goal is to reduce the non-educator workforce to ten percent of the total education workforce, which will yield annual savings of twenty million dollars,” he said.

The PUP plans to then allocate these resources which are saved to fulfilling a number of objectives, including free education from pre-school to sixth form, the establishment of a learning institute for teachers, public access to a BZD $5 million education loan fund, the attainment of a 100% rate of teaching certification (training) among teachers countrywide, public access to a BZD $3 million rural education grant fund, a national feeding program, and more.

The Leader of the Opposition, Hon. John Briceño, also spoke in support of the PUP’s education plan, and stated that it is a way of shaping Belize’s future for the better:

“Now is the time for us to make decisions about what that future looks like. Together, we have to decide if we are going to be a country where only five percent of our children will reach their potential and do spectacularly well, while the others will struggle to get by, or whether we will do right by the next generation…I say, let us give all our children a chance to pursue their dreams so that they all will have the opportunity to succeed,” he said.

The press conference also featured virtual reactions and presentations from multiple Belizean administrators, educators and students.