GOB Expands Free Education Program to Boost High School Enrollment in Southern Belize

The Government of Belize is striving to increase high school enrollment among the thirteen-year-old to the sixteen-year-old population through the expansion of its free education programme. GOB’s free education programme launched in Belize City back in April 2022 and covers tuition, uniforms, books, and supplies. It also contains a feeding program component to ensure that each child gets at least one meal for the day. The program has since been expanded to include schools in southern Belize. Minister of State in the Ministry of Education Dr. Louis Zabaneh says that the program has been helping to minimize dropouts in participating schools. Zabaneh says that the ministry’s data shows just over fifty percent of the target demographic are enrolling in high school, and he hopes the free education program will help to boost enrollment.

Dr.Louis Zabaneh, Minister of State, Ministry of Education: “Across the country as you may know we have been rolling out free high school education. In the Stann Creek district we have Delile, we have Anri, we have Georgetown Technical that are now part of the program and this is gonna be continued rolling out throughout the country over the next few years. Once we get an opportunity to serve these are the kinds of things that we’re doing to make sure that our young people attend school. We know that historically that the high school level we have only been enrolling about 55% of the age cohort that should be in high school, 13 to 16. If you go and look at the data it shows that for decades we have not been able to push beyond 55% until now when we’re making it affordable and accessible and we’re also engaged in making sure that that education is of high quality with the competency based education approach that we have been taking. So I’m very pleased, honored and humbled to be a part of the team that is making this possible for people.”

Last week, Zabaneh held a meeting with scholarship recipients from various schools in southern Belize to discuss expectations of their academic performance.