The Early Childhood Commission (ECC) will continue to prioritise the delivery of quality early-childhood programmes and services in the 2026/27 academic year, as part of its ongoing commitment to Jamaica’s youngest citizens.
ECC Chair, Trisha Williams-Singh, told JIS News that priority will be placed on advancing the national Zero to Three Strategy, which focuses on the first 1,000 days of a child’s life, a period widely recognised as critical to early development.
“We’re looking to integrate health, nutrition, stimulation, and social protection, child protection [and] early intervention, which will directly impact Sustainable Development Goal 4.0,” she outlined.
Mrs. Williams-Singh noted that a key component of this strategy is the Brain Builder Centres, which were established in 2018.
“The Brain Builder Centres are free daycares provided by the Government of Jamaica… . I think we have 110 that have been established… and the aim was to ensure that there were two per constituency. So you want to take the children from their parents a little earlier to ensure that you’re getting proper stimulation [and] proper nutrition,” the Chair explained.
She emphasised that the Centres help prepare children for formal learning by providing a strong foundation during their early developmental years.
“From birth up, we want [them] to have that healthy brain. We want [them] to love going into that learning environment. We want [them] to think critically… and that’s what we’re building from birth,” Mrs. Williams-Singh outlined.
She noted that the Commission will also place emphasis on the revised early-childhood curriculum, which was recently rolled out across the sector.
The ECC has been conducting training sessions for early-childhood practitioners (ECPs) to strengthen their capacity to effectively deliver the revised curriculum in early-childhood institutions.
Mrs. Williams-Singh said the new curriculum features a renewed focus on boys’ education, and science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (STEAM).
Meanwhile, she noted that the ECC will be strengthening its quality assurance and monitoring framework for early-childhood institutions (ECIs).
“We want to strengthen monitoring the protocols for the Brain Builder Centres and the early-childhood setting… and we also want to put emphasis on the revised classroom observation tool that we use, which incorporates alignment with the revised inspection instrument,” Mrs. Williams-Singh outlined.
The ECC recently launched the Early Childhood Care and Education Progress Assessment Tool for Transformation (ECCE PATT), a structured self-assessment instrument developed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to help countries evaluate and strengthen their early-childhood-education systems.
Mrs. Williams-Singh noted that the review is progressing well and that the findings of the assessment are expected to be presented soon.
She further indicated that a comprehensive assessment of compliance among early-childhood institutions will be captured in the Assessment of ECIs 2026 Report, which is expected to be released before December this year.
