BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS, SEPTEMBER 1^ST 2010 (CUOPM) – An increasing number of secondary school leavers in St. Kitts and Nevis are pursuing post secondary education at the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College (CFBC) in St. Kitts and the Sixth Form of the Charlestown Secondary School in Nevis.

According to Federal Minister of Education, Sen. the Hon. Nigel Carty, 456 students registered at the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College (CFBC) for the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) compared to 313 in 2008 and 372 in 2009 and 143 students registered for CAPE at the Sixth Form of the Charlestown Secondary School compared to 138 in 2009 and 107 in 2008.

“This is a good development as it shows that an increasing number of our secondary school leavers are taking the opportunity to pursue post-secondary education at our national college, with the obvious aspiration of some day moving on to university,” said Minister Carty in a national broadcast.

CAPE is taken by students in the Division of Arts, Sciences and General Studies at the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College, and at the Sixth Form of the Charlestown Secondary School.

Students take CAPE at Unit 1 and Unit 2 in selected subject areas. Most Unit 1 courses are taken by Year One students while Unit 2 courses are taken at Year Two.

In his address, Minister Carty, who was given the education portfolio in February this year, said in the 2010 exams, there were 1,417 registered subject entries.

“Of the 1417 registered subject entries, 1234 returned results with 991 passes,” said Minister Carty.

This he said is an overall pass rate so far of 80.30 percent, however, an official query has been made to CXC with respect to the results for Literature in English 1 for which no results have been received.

Minister Carty said the 80.30 percent pass rate, although reasonably satisfactory, is down from 2009 when an 82.38 percent pass rate was obtained. “We await the result of the query in order to compute the final pass rate,” he said.

The Minister of Education, reported fairly high pass rates of over 80 percent returned for Accounting 1, Art & Design 1&2, Biology 2, Caribbean Studies, Chemistry 1&2, Communication Studies, Computer Science 1 & 2, Environmental Science 1&2, French 1&2, Geography 2, Information Technology 2, Law 2, Literatures in English 2, Management of Business 2, Pure Mathematics 2, Physics 2, Sociology 1 and Spanish 1.

“Twelve of these subjects had 100 percent passes,” said Minister Carty, who commended all the lecturers for their hard work.

“Special mention must be made of subjects such as Economics, Management of Business and Sociology in which there is always a high enrollment sometimes over 100 students, which are able to return pass rates of over 75 percent. Success in Law Unit 1 was borderline with a pass rate of 52.8 percent. Pure Mathematics 1, Information Technology 1 and Applied Mathematics, by their less than satisfactory pass rates, are being highlighted here as areas of weakness that must be worked on for improvement,” said Minister Carty.

In relation to the Sixth Form students at the Charlestown Secondary School, total of 143 candidates were registered for 573 subject entries.

“The number of candidates showed the increasing trend as mentioned earlier for the CFBC with 107 in 2008, and 138 in 2009. The average pass rate stands at 82.8 % compared with 86.1 % in 2009.

“The majority of the subjects returned pass rates of over 80 percent, with ten subject areas attaining 100 percent passes. However, Pure Mathematics 1, Communication Studies 1, Physics 2, Geography 1 and Management of Business 1 achieved pass rates below or at 50 percent,” said Minister Carty.

He used the opportunity to congratulate the students and lecturers at the Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College (CFBC) and the Sixth Form of the Charlestown Secondary School for their success and good work.

“I commend the parents of the students for their support, and I encourage all parents to continue to provide the kind of home environment to enable our youth to continue to develop their full potential,” said the Minister of Education.

Basseterre, St. Kitts, September 01, 2010 (SKNIS): The decision to beach the Coast Guard Vessels Stalwart and Ardent was deemed necessary to save lives during the passage of Hurricane Earl.

St. Kitts & Nevis Coast Guard Boats

Cue: Coast Guard_090110_1

National Disaster Coordinator Carl Herbert also appeared on the programme and noted that the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) cautioned all boat owners to seek safe harbour for their vessels as the forecast called for high seas and turbulent waves generated by the Category 1 hurricane. These warnings, coupled with the advisories issued by follower mariners and marine authorities made it unlikely that boats would be at sea during the storm, he added.

Captain Sutton stressed that if the boats were left at sea, a national disaster may have occurred.

Cue: Coast Guard_090110_2

SKNIS conducted Captain Sutton on Wednesday for an update and was told that last evening, Ardent was placed in its cradle and transported via flatbed back to the Coast Guard Base. It has since undergone inspection and findings reveal that there was relatively no damage to the boat resulting from the beaching.

The SKNDF Officer mentioned that efforts will be made to refloat the Stalwart once the weather allows. In the meantime, the Coast Guard continues to patrol and survey the coastline of St. Kitts and Nevis by the use of other vessels.

FOUNDATION reggae and dancehall artiste, Lincoln ‘Sugar’ Minott passed away Saturday night at the University Hospital of the West Indies in St Andrew.

According to Peter Burke, a close associate of the singer, Sugar Minott had complained of feeling ill on Saturday and was taken to the hospital where he died at minutes after 10 pm.

“Sugar had a heart condition and it was about a year and a half ago that he got the first scare. He was in Canada at the time and I was with him. But as soon as the flutters subsided, Sugar was back to being his old self. That is just how he is,” Burke told the Observer.

“This is just so sudden and unexpected. Sugar Minott has made a major contribution to the music business … he was truly an icon and I am going to miss him tremendously,” Burke said,

Sugar Minott, who was born Lincoln Barrington Minott on May 25, 1956, earned for himself the moniker Godfather of Dancehall. He is credited with being the pioneer, who, by laying vocal tracks over the original tapes from the ’60′s, rather than using a live band — as was the norm in those days — caused a revolution in the sound that brought a new style to Reggae music known as dancehall.

A prolific songwriter and singer, Sugar Minott is has over 60 albums and is known for such anthems as Herbsman Hustling, Mr DC, House is not a Home, No Vacancy, Good Thing Going and Never Gonna Give Up Jah.

The veteran singer also distinguished himself as a talent scout/producer and early on in his career established his Black Roots label, which led to the creation of a sound system and a company, Youthman Promotions, to give young artistes a “buss”. Artistes such as Little John, Triston Palmer, Barry Brown, Tony Tuff, Junior Reid, Yami Bolo, Don Angelo, Tenor Saw, Nitty Gritty, Garnet Silk who did his first recording for the Black Roots label, Tony Rebel, Colorman, Daddy Freddie, Johnny Osbourne, Steve “Shalom” Harper are among those who passed through Youthman Promotions.

On hearing of his passing, singers Freddie McGregor, Johnny Osbourne and Leroy Sibbles reportedly volunteered to do a spontaneous tribute at the Rose Garden in Brooklyn New York, where Sugar was scheduled to perform last night. Minott also reportedly had gigs in California later this week including the popular Reggae on the River on July 18.

The Reggae music fraternity has been rocked by a number of deaths in recent months. Minott’s death follows on the heels of IRIE FM founder Karl Young and Voicemail member O’Neil Edwards.

Not a whole lot of kind words were said today.

Jesse James and second ex-wife Janine Lindemulder spent Monday trading barbs in an Orange County courtroom as the fight over custody of their 6-year-old daughter Sunny continued.

While Lindemulder maintains that it’s James—and, at times, Sandra Bullock—who has kept her from speaking regularly with her child on the phone, the now thrice-divorced West Coast Choppers owner continues to argue that his porn-actress ex is just plain unstable.

Though James didn’t go into it on the witness stand, his attorney told Family Court Commissioner Thomas Schulte during today’s hearing that Lindemulder once threatened to kill his client.

James testified, meanwhile, that Lindemulder admitted to him in a phone conversation that she was on strong antidepressants and had a bad reaction when she tried to change meds.

But she counters that she’s been there all along for her daughter—minus the four months she spent in a halfway house for violating probation on a tax-evasion charge—and that it’s James who hasn’t kept up with her court-approved visits and phone calls.

Her attorney, Richard Masson, said that James had promised his client $4,000 a month in support and offered to fly Sunny to Oregon to visit her mom during her stint in the halfway house.

James has said no such conversation ever took place.

As for Sunny’s famous former step-mom:

Lindemulder is arguing that Bullock has tried to poison her own daughter against her and that James’ decision to move to Austin with Sunny is “wholly unjustified.”

She has filed court papers contesting James’ plan, arguing that Bullock would have stayed in California if she wanted to be close to Sunny. (So which is it, cares too much or not enough?)

James has said that he hopes Bullock and Sunny continue to have a relationship, but also that his family doesn’t have the paparazzi problem in Texas that they have here.

James testified today that Bullock took care of Sunny while he spent time in an Arizona rehab facility after the Michelle “Bombshell” McGee story erupted.

His daughter has her own phone now and Bullock, who’s splitting her time between Austin and New Orleans, knows how to get a hold of her, he said.

A teacher from Sunny’s school testified Monday that Bullock once told her, “Quite frankly, I’m glad Janine is in jail. She can go ruin someone else’s life.”

“Both Miss Bullock and Mr. James made derogatory comments,” said Alex Bon of Carden Academy in Huntington Beach. “Sunny looked in shock.”

Bon said that she was instructed not to send any of the child’s artwork to Lindemulder, whom she decribed as “very loving towards Sunny,” while she was in jail.

James also acknowledged that Lindemulder has had four clean drug tests recently, and that their daughter loves her mom very much.

Schulte requested that both sides start coming up with some visitation scenarios should James relocate to Texas with Sunny and ordered everyone back in court tomorrow.