STEM Education Research, Policy and Practice in the Caribbean: Imperatives for the Next Five Years

The last 10 years have seen repeated calls of increasing urgency regarding the importance of STEM and STEM education in the Caribbean regional economy (iNews Guyana, 2018; Mitchell, 2018; Warde & Sah, 2014). In 2019, the Journal of Education and Development in the Caribbean published a special issue entitled “STEM Education in the Caribbean: Challenges, Goals, and Possibilities”. In the Editorial to that special issue, we articulated four primary considerations regarding future regional efforts toward integrated STEM education policy and practice (Sweeney & George, 2019, pp. vii-x). The commentary below (i) offers our reflections on the quality and extent of progress toward this goal approximately 5 years after publication of that Editorial (2019–2024); (ii) highlights what we believe to be the key roles and responsibilities of STEM education scholars in the region; and (iii) provides recommendations for integrated STEM education research, policy, and practice in the Caribbean over the course of the next 5 years.