Fi We Children Foundation presses for firm graduation exclusion rules after Holland High honour student locked out

The Fi We Children Foundation (FWCF) wants sharper legal rules on when schools may shut students out of graduation, after a Holland High School honour student was blocked from the ceremony even though she had been chosen to give the keynote at the school's valedictory service.

The push follows The Gleaner's account of 16-year-old Khadedra Worrell — an honour student, prefect and student leader — who was kept out of last month's graduation because she did not write the school's compulsory Grade Nine Electronic Document Preparation and Management (EDPM) exam.

Worrell, who kept an average above 80 per cent and was put forward to sit eight Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) subjects this year, said she cried through graduation day as her peers collected their diplomas.

"It was very painful. I watched everyone graduate knowing that I worked just as hard," she told The Gleaner.

Her mother, Nicolene McKenzie, asked how her daughter could be fit to deliver the valedictory keynote yet barred from graduating alongside her classmates.

Principal Dayle Evans stood by the school's stance, saying Worrell had not satisfied the institution's graduation conditions. He said sitting the Grade Nine EDPM exam is required under a board-approved policy that parents were told about in meetings, printed handouts and the school's graduation booklet.

In a statement, the FWCF said the episode throws up serious questions about how far school heads may go in shutting students out of graduation ceremonies. The group also flagged that Worrell's family reportedly took the issue to the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information roughly two weeks before the event, yet no step was taken before the ceremony.

That lag, the foundation said, echoes the recent Ascot Primary School graduation row, where ministry action also reportedly arrived only after graduation activities had already run.

The FWCF accepted that schools may set policies under the Education Act, but insisted those rules must line up with the Constitution.

"The Constitution of Jamaica is the supreme law of the land, and all administrative decisions must be lawful, reasonable and procedurally fair," the organisation said, adding that the best interests of the child must stay a primary consideration.

The foundation is pressing the Government to put clearer protections into the Education Act against arbitrary calls, and has urged the Education Ministry to probe the Holland High case and give schools guidance so future decisions stay lawful, transparent and fair.