Some 10 to 12 students and several teachers will not return to their regular classrooms in the next few weeks following the devastation of Hurricane Irma as schools in Ragged Island and Acklins have been deemed irreparable by Education Minister Jeffrey Lloyd.

Mr. Lloyd  told  reporters    yesterday  what  he witnessed while assessing the islands was both heartwarming and heart breaking.

“ There’s nothing else that you can use as a word to describe Duncan Town, Ragged Island  but devastation,” he said.

“The all age school there is  completely gone. It was more than heartbreaking to see the condition of the school. The same in Salina Point, Acklins. So  we’ve got work for us in order to restore those schools in that community back to their original condition;  even better so that they can withstand hurricanes in the future.”

Those students and teachers now displaced,  he said, would be either transferred to Exuma or New Providence.

Additionally, given the number of days that students lost due to the threat of a Hurricane, the time he said will indeed be made up.

“The teaches are professionals and they know what they need to do to make ground up as it were and they will do that, that’s not a problem,” he said.

“The dedication of our teachers is beyond description These are real professional who have dedicated their lives to our children and if that means after school classes or Saturday classes or even Sunday classes, I am very happy and proud to say the teachers are prepared to do it and have been doing it. “

The Education Minister could not say definitively when the rebuilding and repair work would  begin or  would be completed.