Senator Newton Welcomes Engineering Faculty to Antigua Under New ABCAS Bill
Senator Lamin Newton has voiced strong support for the establishment of a Faculty of Engineering under the newly approved Antigua and Barbuda College of Advanced Studies (ABCAS), calling it a significant step toward educational self-sufficiency and economic retention.
During his presentation in the Senate, Newton said the move signals the government’s long-term commitment to developing local capacity in technical and professional fields.
“You have persons who travel to places like Trinidad and Guyana… but we are now moving in that direction where we are bringing that set of studies right here,” he stated, referencing institutions such as the University of the West Indies St. Augustine campus in Trinidad.
Newton argued that offering tertiary-level engineering programmes locally will reduce the need for students to study abroad, keeping both talent and education-related spending within Antigua and Barbuda.
“It speaks to the vision. It speaks to the foresight of the government, the minister, and his team at the Ministry of Education,” he told fellow senators.
The senator also praised the ABCAS Bill for uniting several local institutions under a single tertiary education framework and expanding access to practical and technical fields such as fabrication. He described the bill as “very timely” and an example of government policy focused on empowering young people with the skills needed for national development.
The ABCAS Bill 2025 received support across party lines in both the Lower House and the Senate.
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Spoken like a true person who has never been on a university campus and does not understand the significance of being there.
It is true that you said you changed to Labour because you were getting the chance to go to a university without having to spend money to go abroad. Imagine something like that made you change to a whole different party. Or was that really it? Maybe you did not know that there are standards to be met for qualifying to attend university, and also that you can get a scholarship and go to a university without having to pay, if that was your biggest worry.
Now after a few years you are an authority on everything when you are on Pointe. Now you are an authority on engineering and what constitutes an engineering institution.
May I point out that not even our secondary schools have technical nor wood working subjects on their syllabus. How about advising your masters that it would be more beneficial to build or improve the institutions we currently have. Like stop undermining the State College by raiding the students just to say you have a successful university at Five Islands.
A university is planned, built, equipped and staffed. Please remember that Five Islands WAS A SECONDARY SCHOOL built for youngsters who really needed one. Now you and your government are going after already built institutions. Can’t you all build your own?
Dear Lazymin, how about encouraging your new lord and master, the new one who you would take a bullet for, to improve the school system that is stagnant and in too many cases getting worse, instead of starting from the top with a university and college of advanced studies? How about leaving these advanced studies until he has first promoted the primary and secondary studies?
Can’t you see that our young ones are losing hope right before our very eyes? Can’t you see that focus must be placed on our teachers and institutions if we are to point the education of our young people in the right direction?
Does neither of you realize that you are trying to start from the top down?
Our country is crying for a leader who wants the whole country to do well and not just he and his chosen few.
Our poor Antigua & Barbuda is suffocating under this brown sludge.
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