SANTA CRUZ, St Elizabeth — Classes resumed at the St Elizabeth Technical High School (STETHS) on Monday even as the school’s leadership continues its investigation into a series of fights which led to the institution being shuttered for two days last week.

On Monday STETHS Principal Keith Wellington told the Jamaica Observer that several reports are to be provided to oversight bodies before a decision is made about action against those involved in the schoolyard brawls.

“It is a process. What I can tell you is that we have resumed school today [Monday]… as per normal. We are still going through the process of completing our investigation and we will make the referrals to the various places that we need to,” said Wellington.

“We need to obviously complete the investigations and provide the school board with a complete report. We have to provide the Ministry [of Education] with a further report and if we need to refer students to any type of services then we will also have to do that,” added Wellington.

Last Wednesday Wellington told parents and guardians that classes had to be suspended at the school due to a series of incidents on campus.

He said then that the action had been taken to protect the safety of all members of the school community and ensure that provisions were made to maintain discipline.

At that time sources told the Observer that the decision to shutter the campus to only students sitting external exams and some preparing for sporting competitions, stemmed from the multiple fights — one of which allegedly involved a student with a knife — on Wednesday.

Reports are that mid-morning Wednesday a student was injured during a confrontation which required the intervention of the police.

The sources say, following that incident, several other fights broke out at the school including some in the presence of senior administrators.

When asked about the atmosphere at the school in the wake of the fights, Wellington said he was hopeful for a return to normalcy.

“[We are] optimistic that we can use this as an opportunity to get our students to refocus and realign themselves with what their true goals and objectives are as students,” said Wellington as he pointed out that the school has also been steadily recovering and rebuilding six months after it was battered by Category 5 Hurricane Melissa.

“It is on the way not yet completed. We are expecting that by the end of next month almost all the work will be completed,” he said.

An arrangement of class rotation has also ended at school with more classrooms being accessible to grades excluding students sitting external examinations.

“Grade eleven students and sixth formers are no longer using classrooms, because they are all doing exams, so we have those rooms being freed up, so we don’t have to keep a group out each day,” said Wellington.

“Without fifth and sixth formers we are down to just under 1,200 students,” said Wellington of the Santa Cruz based school which has a population of 1,670 students.

WELLINGTON… we are still going through the process of completing our investigation and we will make the referrals to the various places that we need to.