When Andreen Rose-Cephas got pregnant at age 16 while attending a prominent high school in Kingston in 1987, she was devastated. “I didn’t know what to do, where to turn and a lot of things kept going through my mind initially when I found out,” she recalls in an interview with JIS News. Mrs. Rose-Cephas, who is the youngest of...

Food and Nutrition, and Hospitality and Villa Services students at the Marcus Garvey Technical High School in St. Ann have been exposed to innovative ways of preparing meals without salt, in commemoration of Salt Awareness week. The initiative saw chefs from Sandals Ocho Rios visiting the institution on March 10 to demonstrate alternative approaches to meal preparation to help improve...

The face mask could not hide the broad smile on the face of Henry Dwyer, as he received the key to his new home at 8 Donmair Close in St. Andrew from Prime Minister, the Most Hon. Andrew Holness recently. After decades of living in a dilapidated board structure, the elderly man and his son, Milton, were happy to finally...

A call for more women to get involved in local sports, which is important to building critical life skills, rang out at Iona High School in Tower Isle, St. Mary, on International Women's Day (March 8). The message came from American-Jamaican Bobsledder, Jazmine Fenlator-Victorian, who, in partnership with the Sandals Foundation, held a special ceremony for the young girls of...

Former educator, Booker T. Washington, once said: “Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome.” On examining the life of top Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) History Unit 2 student and St. Andrew High School for Girls past student, Melissa Blair, this statement...

Six schools in St. James and Hanover have benefited from a donation of much-needed educational supplies and personal protective equipment (PPE), valued at US $5,000, by three American teenagers. The supplies, which include hand sanitisers, masks, face shields, gloves, books, pencils, crayons, and other stationery supplies, were handed over to St. James Preparatory, Providence Basic, and Farm, Glendevon and Goodwill...

During 2021, the Legal Aid Council (LAC) continued to carry out its core mandate of providing equal access to justice to all Jamaicans. Executive Director of the LAC, Dian Watson, told JIS News that the Council provides legal advice and representation for criminal matters to persons who cannot afford an attorney. She said representation is provided by two methods, through...

Aggie Reynolds, a 73-year-old resident of Flagaman in St. Elizabeth, is a happy and proud landowner today, having received a certificate of title for her property under the National Land Agency’s (NLA) Systematic Land Registration (SLR) titling programme. She is among 35 residents who were recently presented with their titles during a ceremony at Newell High School in St. Elizabeth...

The new genome sequencing machine acquired through support from the CHASE Fund should strengthen the region’s capacity to test for new variants of the coronavirus (COVID-19). Before the machine was sourced, samples were sent to Trinidad for testing, being the only other Caribbean country at the time with a genome sequencer. This meant that Jamaican samples were queued behind the...