GLENMUIR High School alumni Colleen Lowe is the new clerk to the Houses of Parliament.

The Jamaica Observer has confirmed that Governor General Sir Patrick Allen has appointed Lowe to take on the top administrative role in the Houses of Parliament.

Lowe’s appointment is to take effect today with an official announcement from King’s House, or the Houses of Parliament, expected shortly.

Lowe is an attorney-at-law who has been serving as deputy clerk of the Houses of Parliament for some time.

According to checks by the Observer, Lowe is a graduate of the University of Hertfordshire and the Bar Professional Training Course at the BPP Law School in the United Kingdom.

She was called to the United Kingdom Bar at Lincoln Inn Fields in 2012 and the Jamaican Bar in 2014.

Lowe holds a certificate of legal education from Norman Manley Law School, and is also the holder of a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Suffolk in the United Kingdom.

She previously served in senior legal positions at the National Land Agency and the Electoral Commission of Jamaica (ECJ). She was appointed Deputy Clerk to the Houses of Parliament in 2022.

Lowe replaces Valrie Curtis, who served as Clerk to the Houses of Parliament from August 2021 to last Saturday when she retired, ending her decades-long parliamentary career.

In a short statement announcing Curtis’s departure last week, the Houses of Parliament said Curtis would proceed on retirement, “having reached the age of retirement in April 2021, and having been granted an extension for an additional two years to expire upon reaching the age of 67 years”.

Curtis began her parliamentary career as assistant clerk in 1995. She was appointed deputy clerk in 2006 and served as acting clerk in October 2020 when the then clerk, Heather Cooke, took leave of absence.