KINGSTON, Jamaica (JIS) –The Ministry of Education, Youth and Information will begin full the roll-out of the Trafficking in Persons (TIP) curriculum in schools when the 2016/17 academic year gets underway in September.

This follows the success of the pilot introduced in 49 institutions across the island in September 2015.

The curriculum will be implemented in over 500 primary and secondary institutions across the ministry’s six regions.

The curriculum, jointly developed with the National Task Force Against Trafficking in Persons, aims to promote greater awareness among students and teachers of human trafficking.

Trafficking in persons is defined as the trade of humans, most commonly for forced labour, sexual slavery, or commercial sexual exploitation by traffickers or other persons.

Assistant Chief Education Officer in the Core Curriculum Unit, Dr Clover Hamilton-Flowers, said the Trafficking in Persons curriculum will be treated as support material in the new National Standards Curriculum.

She said the curriculum will be integrated in lessons in Social Studies, Religious Education, Information and Communications Technology (ICT), Physical Education and Sports, and History.

Teachers have been trained to help them understand the focus of the curriculum, the methodology they are supposed to use to incorporate it based on their context.

The Trafficking in Persons curriculum is geared towards helping persons see the issue as a global crime, as well as getting persons to identify means of preventing it and helping to reduce the vulnerability of persons, especially children and young people.

Dr Hamilton-Flowers said the impact of the curriculum is dependent on the approach that teachers use to bring the topics across to students.

Director of Safety and Security in Schools, Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Coleridge Minto, tells JIS News that School Resource Officers (SROs) are also being prepared “so that they, too, can help to promote the awareness of trafficking in persons and the dangers associated with it.”

He informs that sensitisation sessions have also been held at several high schools, pointing out that “the Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Unit in the Jamaica Constabulary Force gives us tremendous support… (as) they go into the schools and also do presentations.”

ASP Minto tells JIS News that presentations are also being made to parents, to sensitise them to the dangers of human trafficking, “and how they can mitigate (its impact for) both themselves and their children.”

Regarding curriculum development for tertiary institutions, ASP Minto “we continue to seek to dialogue and forge partnerships with the universities, so that those who (may) have missed (initial presentations) when we were introducing (the subject), can benefit.”

Meanwhile, ASP Minto says the ministry has incorporated information on human trafficking in its Safety and Security Guidelines, which were drafted and issued to schools at the start of the 2015/16 academic year.

He explains that the manual, which can also be accessed on the ministry’s website, defines trafficking in persons and provides guidelines in terms of actions which institutions can and should take, in the event of a suspected case, which would involve the police and other key stakeholders.