to develop educational content – whether for traditional classroom delivery or for e- and distributed learning. Ideally, this should be centrally based in order to maximize scarce skills, to ensure that content is of the appropriate quality and reflects curriculum requirements, as well as to secure the promulgation of such content at a national level. Moreover, the introduction of ICT Internet based facilities for schools requires a strong security framework that ensures that children are restricted from accessing high risk and pornographic content and that such blocking is maintained on a daily basis in order to ensure that it gives real rather than just perceived security. This is fundamental in order to provide the adequate level of protection to children as well as to secure parental trust and confidence in the provision of internet access to their children. It is pertinent to underline that, there does not seem to be an ICT in Schools strategy that seeks to define a cohesive and coordinated way forward. There is no national ICT curriculum. In essence what this means is that schools – which are both church and state schools - set their own curriculum for ICT.4 ICT IN THE BELIZEAN WORKFORCE According to the 2009 Scoping Exercise Report, The Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry opines while many firms have some form of Internet access, relatively few employees have individual access. Employees that do have their own e-mail accounts typically work for large firms. The total number of corporate websites is unknown, but is thought to be quite high. However, these sites are typically modest in nature, with limited information that is not updated regularly. In terms of computer applications, some office automation software is in use. Larger firms have some enterprise application software. The Chamber of Commerce also opines that the use of ICTs in the workplace is also fairly limited. Although virtually all businesses have computers and access to the internet, a significant number of employees share computers and only a few have personal e-mail addresses for use in the work environment. 4 The Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) does set a regional CXC Computer Science exam which many secondary schools in Belize prepare their students for. Belize ICT National Strategy 29