Special needs school to benefit all Caricom members

Cuban Ambassador to Guyana Julio César González Marchante, along with members of the Caribbean Community (Caricom) Secretariat and Government officials, on Friday visited the construction site of the special needs facility for persons with disabilities located within the compound of the Cyril Potter College of Education (CPCE).
The Regional Centre for Stimulating the Development of Children and Young People with Special Educational Needs Associated with Disabilities is aimed at training persons to manage individuals with disabilities.
The training to be provided includes evaluation and diagnosis, language therapy, occupational therapy, psychological treatment, prevention, rehabilitation and social integration services, with a psycho-pedagogical and socially inclusive approach.
Ambassador Marchante said he was pleased with the progress of the building. The Centre is the fruit of deepening relations between the Caricom Region and the Government of Cuba.
“We will continue developing that; this is one of the proofs, it is something that we can share and we will continue collaborating with Caricom through our relations,” Ambassador Marchante said.
In early December, Caricom Secretary General Irwin LaRocque, along with Guyana’s Foreign Affairs Minister Carl Greenidge and Ambassador Marchante signed a Tripartite Cooperation and Technical Assistance Agreement at a ceremony held at the Caricom Secretariat.
Guyana will host the Regional Centre which will use Cuba’s extensive experience to assist Caricom Member States to meet the special educational needs associated with disabilities.
Two years ago in Havana at the fifth Caricom-Cuba Summit, it was proposed that Cuba would cooperate with Caricom in nine specific areas, including “the creation of a training centre for the treatment of physical disabilities to assist physically challenged children and youths.”
That Caricom-Cuba Summit came a year after a high-level ministerial meeting in Haiti in 2013 where the Petionville Declaration recommended specific national and regional actions to address the needs of people with disabilities.
The Caricom Secretary General, in his remarks at the signing ceremony, said the project emphasised the interest of all parties to address a very important social and humanitarian challenge facing the Region, and aimed to use Cuba’s extensive experience in this area to assist Caricom Member States in improving the lives of a vulnerable sector of the population.