‘Make the right choices’ - Holness urges students to align studies with job demands

Prime Minister Andrew Holness is encouraging students to align their education and skills with the needs of the labour market.

"The probability of you leaving school and not being employed is getting smaller and smaller; so that means that when you leave school, you will get a job. Now the question is going to be, 'alright, we now have jobs ... but what about income?' And to get high levels of income, you need to enter the world of work with higher levels of skills ... and not just that, you need to make sure that your career choices and your training choices align with the future of work," he said.

The prime minister made the remarks while speaking with students of Kingston Technical High School last Friday. Holness toured the Rose Gardens and Parade Gardens in downtown Kingston where the Project STAR (Social Transformation and Renewal) initiative is being implemented. He said Jamaica's labour pool is not adequate to meet the demands of the economy, arguing that students who are going to graduate to enter the workforce need to be highly skilled and well-trained to meet the needs of the various industries.

"So even though we do have many jobs in the economy, there is some level of what is called structural unemployment, meaning that [youngsters] are leaving school with skills that are not relevant to the jobs that are available," he said.

"So you have to make sure that you make the right choices for the jobs that are available in your economy. You have to align your education and your skills to the jobs that are going to be available in our economy," Holness said.