Free education to extend to pre-school students

The current free education for primary and secondary school students will extend to the pre-school students from the beginning of the second term in 2015.

This was revealed during the 114th Fiji Principals Association Conference closing remarks today by the Minister for Education, National Heritage, Cultural and Arts Dr Mahendra Reddy.

Reddy said there are several new initiatives that will be announced soon after he gets cabinet endorsement.

He said all these are geared towards dealing with improving quality of education, reducing administrative work by teachers, improving teachers contact hours and improving classroom teaching.

Reddy told the 170 principals present at the conference that most of them are there but we need a major change in work culture, attitude and commitment from the significant few.

Meanwhile, he said Fiji is a fairer, a more just, and a more compassionate society and against the backdrop of the rapidly strengthening economy, our war against poverty, crime, sickness and climate change will soon prevail if we make change in education work for us and not against.