A new curriculum for public schools is to be brought in from abroad — and Bermudianised.

New Board of Education chairman Mark Byrne and Education Minister El James have revealed that a plan to rewrite the current curriculum following an audit from overseas consultants has been shelved.

Mr. Byrne told The Royal Gazette: "We decided to take a different course, which is that we are going to take a look at a number of international curricula, with a goal of seeing if we can adapt an international curriculum. My view is it makes more sense."

The interim executive board on education — a temporary group appointed to implement the recommendations in the Hopkins report — was behind the rewrite plan.

But the board, chaired by Bank of Bermuda CEO Philip Butterfield, was disbanded at the end of last year and a new permanent Board of Education announced earlier this month.

Mr. Byrne said: "I think there was different direction at the time and the board has concluded otherwise. Why would we write a curriculum for 13 school years for a population of 5,000?

"The real problem it creates is accreditation. It's not a universal, international qualification [at the end of it]. We think they would be better off to have a qualification that was universally recognised."

He added: "We don't want to lose the Bermudian cultural content but an international curriculum prescribes about 85 percent of what we study.

"In that 15 percent left, it's quite common for them to localise the content. It means that the core subjects that count are being taught in an accessible way. I think it's important that we get Bermudian content into it. I don't anticipate that's going to be that difficult to do."

He revealed that curricula from the UK and Canada are being studied, along with others, and that a subcommittee of the board has been tasked with finding the right choice for Bermuda. "Our goal is to be teaching at least some of the content of the new curriculum in some schools by September 2009."

Mr. Byrne said by September 2010 it should be system-wide.

Mr. James said: "We need a curriculum that's going to be internationally recognised, so that our kids can leave here and go on wherever. That's the first task of the new board. We'll localise it or onionise it to make it right for Bermuda."

He added: "Literacy and numeracy will be our top priorities. Then, of course, we would love to have some local history coordinator, really teaching individuals about Bermuda history: the struggle over the last 400 years. We have come from settlers running up on our shores to what we are today."

The Minister said a replacement for the Bermuda School Certificate had not yet been identified but was being discussed.