SAVANNA-LA-MAR, Westmoreland — The Ministry of Education is working to replicate the innovative Savanna-la-Mar Inclusive Academy (Sav Inclusive) educational model across the island to better meet the growing needs of children with special needs.

This represents a significant shift towards inclusive education for children with the need for specialised support within the existing school system.

“Sav Inclusive is an interesting and important model for how the Government and the private sector can work together to expand access to specialised education, and this is important. We are supporting from the Ministry of Education but we’re also learning. We are learning from Sav Inclusive,” said Minister of Education Senator Dr Dana Morris Dixon as she addressed the ground-breaking ceremony for the construction of a high school department at the institution on Thursday.

“What you are doing is not just for Savanna-la-Mar, what you are doing is going to enhance the lives of children as we have here all over Jamaica,” stated Morris Dixon.

Sav Inclusive was established by the Rockhouse Foundation — the philanthropic arm of Rockhouse Hotel in Negril — in partnership with the Ministry of Education, the Roman Catholic Church in Jamaica — which provided the land — and other local and international partners. It currently has an enrolment of 290 students.

“At this school, you are going all the way through. You have your infant department, you have your primary department, and now you have your high school. We don’t have that model available to us. You are also doing interventions right here. Students don’t have to go somewhere else… That’s a model that we have to replicate elsewhere in the education system,” declared Morris Dixon.

But the education minister raised concerns about the future of children with special needs once they have completed their schooling.

“Many of our special education students they are locked at home when they age out of the formal education system, and that is not fair to them,” stated Morris Dixon.

“We have to provide spaces for them and we need partners in the private sector who will be willing to take some of our children and to have them feel like they are meaningfully contributing to their country,” reasoned Morris Dixon.

She explained that a key aspect of the Education Ministry’s replication plan is the integration of special education departments within existing schools, rather than building stand-alone institutions.

“One of the most important things that Sav Inclusive does is the inclusive element of it… Children with special education needs should be in an inclusive setting. And that again is what this school does beautifully,” said Morris Dixon.

To achieve this, the ministry plans to utilise excess capacity in former All-Age schools converted to primary schools by creating special education departments within them.

“Where we have schools with excess capacity, we will be putting departments in those schools… Those extra classrooms can become special ed departments within the schools,” explained Morris Dixon as she emphasised the broader social benefits of such an inclusive approach

“They all wear the same uniform. They walk together, they get to school together, they are on the same compound. They may go to a different class, but then they are having lunch together, they’re playing sports together, they’re doing all the extra-curricular activities together. That’s the model. We’re taking some elements of Sav Inclusive and trying to retrofit what we already have,” said Morris Dixon.

“It makes them better people because it normalises the fact that there are others who may not be like you, but they can still be your friend… What you do is create a kinder set of people. We’re creating kinder citizens. And that’s really what we want in this country. I’m a big believer in inclusion, and in terms of policy coming out of the ministry, we’re going to ensure that we focus a lot more on that,” Morris Dixon added.

Rockhouse Foundation Chairman Paul Salmon explained that since the start of the new school term, the first cohort of high school students — Grade 7 — was accepted. He said the high school will be built out by adding new classrooms each year, starting in the summer of 2027.

“Over the last 22 years — since we established the Rockhouse Foundation in 2004 — we have worked on six school projects [in] Westmoreland and the Negril Library project. This is one of the six and we have now spent $2 billion on education in Westmoreland,” stated Salmon.

“Over the next seven or eight years, we’ll probably spend another billion dollars on the build-out of the school here [at Savanna-la-Mar Inclusive],” added Salmon.