The Jamaican government says approximately 50 institutions have been selected to participate in a pilot under the Digital Transformation for School Management Project. This initiative will be implemented on a phased basis and funded by a US$200,000 Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) grant.
Education and Youth Minister Fayval Williams said an estimated 20 percent of the national budget goes towards education, noting that “we need to have a better handle on the spend to ensure… it’s going to the right places, and we are getting the results we should have.
“The general objective of this technical cooperation is to assist the Ministry in developing processes and systems to capture and analyze detailed school-level income, expenditure, and student management data to support effective management [of school resources],” Mrs. Williams said.
Speaking at the IDB’s Financial Management Pilot School Sensitisation Forum, Mrs. Williams noted that the project will benefit Jamaica by way of implementation into the school system.
“As managers in your own right, I implore you to apply the skills taught in how you conduct the nation’s business. Once the pilot is completed, we will move to a phased implementation of this project in our primary and secondary schools. This will add to the digitization that is underway in the education system.”
Mrs. Williams said the Accountant General’s Department is also involved in the project.
The project objectives include:
- I made recording and managing day-to-day financial transactions easy, electronic, and efficient.
- We provide a centralized platform to view and manage financial data in schools, educational regions, and the central Ministry.
- It is developing operating procedures that will allow for the timely use of financial data to make informed decisions about funding allocations.
