Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly says 60 mi­grants have ap­plied for their chil­dren to at­tend school come Sep­tem­ber.

Speak­ing yes­ter­day dur­ing the com­mis­sion­ing of the Sis­ter Bernadette de la Bastide Wing at Holy Name Con­vent in Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day, the min­is­ter said since the reg­is­tra­tion process be­gan on June 25 at var­i­ous Ed­u­ca­tion Min­istry dis­trict of­fices around the coun­try, 60 par­ents had ap­plied for their chil­dren to at­tend school.

How­ev­er, ap­prox­i­mate­ly 20 of them were un­suc­cess­ful.

“This is the third day. We had around 60-some­thing ap­pli­ca­tions thus far with just over 40 suc­cess­ful ap­pli­ca­tions be­ing made...right now we are in ap­pli­ca­tion mode,” Gads­by-Dol­ly said.

Ac­cord­ing to a no­tice is­sued by the Ed­u­ca­tion Min­istry, par­ents of Venezue­lan chil­dren are re­quired to vis­it the dis­trict of­fice clos­est to them on Tues­days and Thurs­days on­ly, to com­plete the ap­pli­ca­tion form.

The min­is­ter ex­plained that af­ter the ap­pli­ca­tion process, they would li­aise with the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­istry for ver­i­fi­ca­tion.

“Of course, it’s not an open thing for Venezue­lans—it’s for those who bear the cur­rent mi­grant doc­u­men­ta­tion,” she said.

Nine­teen Ro­man Catholic schools were ear­marked for the en­rol­ment of 200 Venezue­lan chil­dren whose par­ents legal­ly reg­is­tered in this coun­try in 2019.

The min­is­ter said ac­cord­ing to the law, the mi­grant pupils have to be placed in a school where T&T na­tion­als are not dis­ad­van­taged. She said most of the Ro­man Catholic schools are lo­cat­ed in cen­tral and south Trinidad where many mi­grants have set­tled.