THE Overseas Examinations Commission (OEC) has donated more than 3,000 desktop computers to some 100 schools across Jamaica in an initiative aimed at improving the information and communication technology (ICT) capacity of secondary schools.

Dubbed the ‘Computers in Secondary Schools Project’, the programme is part of the OEC’s corporate social responsibility and is in keeping with the new thrust of the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) to pursue online testing for secondary schools.

This investment in the schools is being done in partnership with the OEC’s parent ministry, the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information, and with the approval of its board of commissioners as it seeks to bolster the delivery of the tenets of its mandate to oversee the administration of examinations locally as well as the provision of relevant support services.

The OEC has been investing in secondary schools across the island since 2017 to help them prepare for e-testing. Twenty-one schools are set to benefit under the current tranche of the programme.

Gaynstead High School, Immaculate Conception High School, and St Hughs High School for Girls were recently gifted their computers, with Haile Selassie High School selected as the next school to benefit.

“We are now in tranche six of the programme, through which we are providing 630 computers — each of the 21 schools in this phase will receive 30 computers,” said Krystle Daley-Thompson, director of marketing and client relations at the OEC.

Daley-Thompson pointed out that the schools are gifted computer systems, inclusive of software.