Says that Early Childhood Education Key to Future Learning Success
The Prime Minister of St. Maarten the Honorable Sarah Wescot-Williams extended words of welcome and encouragement at the opening of the 2013 Early Childhood Educational Conference which was held on Wednesday Evening at the Maho Convention Center.
The Conference, held under the theme of ‘The Future of Early Childhood Education on St. Maarten’ brought together educators and educational experts from around the region discussing innovations in early childhood education and the future of such for the Country.
The Prime Minister extended her words of appreciation and welcome while also highlighting the crucial importance of early childhood education to the development of the country: "In a special way I would like to welcome those of you who have travelled to be on St. Maarten in order to be here at this conference. I wish to commend the organizers; it is quite timely to stand still for a moment in order to reflect on where early childhood education on St. Maarten will look like in the future. However, we cannot do this without reflecting where we have come from and recognizing the important strides we have been making in developing early childhood education for, although we are still faced with some challenges, we have indeed come a long way.
"It has been shown, over and over again and through various studies, that children who had the opportunity for quality early childhood education excelled in their later educational career. Research has shown that this is indeed a fact and so on St. Maarten the push has always been to include as many of our young children in early childhood education as possible. Over the years the focus on the quality of early childhood education has become very clear, as all partners including SIFMA, Government, Caregivers and parents have worked together to improve the quality of care and education for the youngest residents of St. Maarten. In, 2010, when the first early childhood care and education conference was held in Moscow a reflection was made with respect to how far the entire world came with respect to the education for all. The first goal of that education is the accessibility and availability for early childhood education in the countries globally. If we localize that thought to our situation here on St. Maarten we can indeed look back on the growth and development of early childhood education and establish how and where we want to go in the future regarding the development of our youngest St. Maarteners, especially given all that we know regarding the importance of educating them early on. And by doing this we will build the future leaders of this society," emphasized the Prime Minister.