By Late Night with Andrew Dick
PHILIPSBURG: Nearly a decade after a contractor walked off the job site, the students of Prins Willem Alexander School (PWAS) continue to learn in temporary spaces, while the ruins of their promised new school remain untouched, a symbol of silence, stagnation, and systemic neglect.
The project was once pitched as a flagship upgrade: a state-of-the-art facility to serve students with special education needs. However, in 2017, the contractor—Designer’s Choice NV—halted construction, reportedly stripping the site of usable materials before abandoning the project. No new contractor was assigned. No official statement followed. What was left behind is a school only on paper, and a community left behind with it.
Today, PWAS students remain relocated to the Alma Fleming Educational Care Facility in Belvedere. What was meant to be temporary has become permanent. Shared spaces, limited resources, and mounting frustration define their daily routine.
Yet even as students, teachers, and parents wait for answers, the Ministry of Education is now pushing ahead with reforms, not for the building, but for the school itself. Last week, Minister Melissa Gumbs presented findings from an independent investigation into conditions at PWAS. The report identified gaps in leadership, student support, and infrastructure. A reform team is being created. The director is set to return. And a campus inspection is due by July 1, 2025.
“Every child deserves an environment where they can thrive,” Minister Gumbs said, pledging transparency and urgency.
However, for many, the environment remains a borrowed one. There is no mention—yet—of restarting the stalled construction or a plan for completing the abandoned school building. The conversation focuses on internal reform, rather than the physical foundation.
This disconnect raises questions: How can a school be reformed if it has no permanent home? Why has there been no accountability for the contractor? And why does a government that swiftly commissions investigations into internal failures struggle to act when private firms fail to deliver?
This isn’t an isolated case. Over the years, other school construction projects have faced similar fates—delays, disputes, and silence. Classrooms are left incomplete. Students are left in limbo.
The parents of PWAS students say the reforms are welcome but incomplete. “Fix the program, sure,” one mother said outside the Belvedere facility. “But where is the school?”
Until that question is answered, the shadow of a concrete skeleton continues to loom—visible proof that in St. Maarten, even promises made in brick and mortar can disappear without explanation.
