MoE: All 143 schools/centres remain open

The Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion has as­sured par­ents, guardians, and the pub­lic that schools across Trinidad and To­ba­go con­tin­ue to op­er­ate in a safe and se­cure man­ner, with learn­ing ac­tiv­i­ties on­go­ing in all ed­u­ca­tion dis­tricts.

It comes as sev­er­al schools across the coun­try dis­missed their stu­dents ear­ly, amid re­ports many teach­ers did not show up to school to­day.

The Min­istry said at­ten­dance da­ta re­flects steady stu­dent par­tic­i­pa­tion na­tion­wide.

It con­firmed that all 143 op­er­a­tional Gov­ern­ment and Gov­ern­ment-As­sist­ed Ear­ly Child­hood Care and Ed­u­ca­tion (EC­CE) cen­tres re­main open, with cur­ricu­lum de­liv­ery ac­tive­ly un­der­way.

Sev­er­al Pri­ma­ry and Sec­ondary ed­u­ca­tion dis­tricts have re­port­ed pos­i­tive lev­els of stu­dent at­ten­dance. Ca­roni and St. George East dis­tricts record­ed strong stu­dent turnout, while Vic­to­ria and South-East­ern dis­tricts demon­strat­ed con­sis­tent teacher and stu­dent pres­ence.

The Min­istry stat­ed that on­ly one per cent of Pri­ma­ry and Sec­ondary schools ex­pe­ri­enced ear­ly dis­missal, re­flect­ing over­all sta­bil­i­ty and con­ti­nu­ity in the ed­u­ca­tion sys­tem.

The Min­istry not­ed a re­cent vari­a­tion in teacher at­ten­dance, which dif­fers from the usu­al trend of ap­prox­i­mate­ly 91 per cent.

“The col­lec­tive agree­ment be­tween the Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer and the Trinidad and To­ba­go Uni­fied Teach­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion for the pe­ri­od Oc­to­ber 1, 2020, to Sep­tem­ber 30, 2023, has been ful­ly rat­i­fied, with all im­ple­men­ta­tion guid­ance is­sued. The agree­ment is now in the im­ple­men­ta­tion phase, and there is no in­di­ca­tion that any with­draw­al of labour is war­rant­ed,” the Min­istry said in the re­lease.

It added: “Teach­ers oc­cu­py a role of pub­lic trust, with re­spon­si­bil­i­ties that ex­tend be­yond con­trac­tu­al mat­ters to in­clude pro­fes­sion­al, eth­i­cal, and moral oblig­a­tions to stu­dents.”

The Min­istry em­pha­sized that ac­tions that in­ter­rupt the school day can af­fect stu­dent learn­ing, place strain on par­ents and fam­i­lies, and im­pact the over­all func­tion­ing of the ed­u­ca­tion sys­tem.

Dr. the Hon. Michael Dowlath, Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion, stat­ed:

“We re­main stead­fast in our com­mit­ment to safe­guard­ing the ed­u­ca­tion of our na­tion’s chil­dren, and we ex­pect all stake­hold­ers to up­hold this shared re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.”

He added: “I take this time to sin­cere­ly thank the many teach­ers who re­port­ed for du­ty and con­tin­ue to sup­port stu­dents’ learn­ing, par­tic­u­lar­ly dur­ing this sen­si­tive pe­ri­od in the aca­d­e­m­ic cal­en­dar. Your ac­tions re­flect a strong sense of pro­fes­sion­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty, du­ty of care, and com­mit­ment to stu­dent suc­cess.”

The Min­istry re­mind­ed par­ents and guardians to con­tin­ue send­ing stu­dents to school. The Min­istry reaf­firmed its com­mit­ment to main­tain­ing a sta­ble, sup­port­ive, and se­cure learn­ing en­vi­ron­ment for all stu­dents, es­pe­cial­ly in the lead-up to the Sec­ondary En­trance As­sess­ment on March 26, 2026, and the Caribbean Ex­am­i­na­tions Coun­cil ex­am­i­na­tions com­menc­ing April 13, 2026.