 The forum, into its third of four yearly sessions mandated under the Pearl Programme, provides early childhood educators, ECEs, with a platform to chart the way forward for the sector, focusing on key areas. According to organisers, the 2024 activity allowed participants to learn about and to reflect on their particular situations with young children with autism spectrum disorder or ASD. The forum simultaneously took place in the Four Winwood Islands, with some 200 early childhood educators participating via the Zoom platform. The two-day activity, which took place locally at the Finance Administration Centre, according to training officer with St Lucia's Early Childhood Services Unit, Ruth Phillips-Faivier, concluded with each member state developing preliminary plans to act on the information shared and discussions held during the forum, including support to families with children with ASD. It's something we have been struggling with as a sector and post-COVID, we have indeed seen a marked increase with the number of children who exhibit cognitive, sensory, emotional challenges. This Phillips-Faivier advised practitioners on the correct course of action if they ever discover students who may require special ASD attention. If you think there's a child at your centre who exhibits signs, behaviours that may make you suspect the child has autism, your job is to do referrals. Do not tell the parent, oh, your child has autism. Take your child, that's not your job. I emphasise that. One of the challenges that ECE leaders have raised since the beginning of their work together on the Perl is ensuring that ECE teachers are better equipped to support children with special education needs. The OECS Secretariat's Royston-Emanuel thinks the diverse mix of professionals from the OECS as a whole will be instrumental in achieving the fundamental objective of the OECS Perl, which is to increase equity, access and the standard of education in all member states, especially in dealing with the growing issue of ASD. This not only highlights the urgency to act, but it actually places a clear responsibility on us, on the member states to use the insights that we're going to glean from this to their experience and to help uplift our most vulnerable population. International studies confirm the rising frequency of ASD impairment in Latin America and the Caribbean grew from 1 in 10,000 children in 1943 to 15 in every 1,000 children in 2015. From the Communications Unit of the Department of Education, Innovation and Vocational Training, I am Chris Satney reporting.