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Good practice Imported

Curaçao's UNESCO AI Readiness Assessment — Mapping AI Governance and Classroom Adoption on a Small Island

Curaçao · Willemstad · See the Curaçao profile

Evidence: Observational / pre–post Top 89% 27/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

UNESCO and Curaçao's government completed the Caribbean's first island-state AI Readiness Assessment: AI use is concentrated in tourism marketing (~40% of operators) while a 25,000-user school digitalisation drive gives teachers early, informal ChatGPT training.

over 25,000 users
MOWCS digitalisation project users
over 80 %
Schools connected to the internet for educational purposes
7 to 1 ratio
Male-to-female ratio, engineering graduates
5-7 %
Estimated national AI adoption (public and private sectors)
over 60 people across 40 organisations consultees
Stakeholders consulted for the assessment

Details

Promoter
UNESCO Office for the Caribbean; Curaçao Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports (MOWCS)
Period
2024-2025
Keywords
AI governance, education policy, public sector digitalisation, teacher training

Context

UNESCO's Office for the Caribbean and Curaçao's Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports (MOWCS) completed a national Artificial Intelligence Readiness Assessment (RAM) in 2024, published in 2025 — Curaçao is described in the report as 'the first small island to conduct and launch such an assessment.' Minister Sithree van Heydoorn launched the report on 4 April 2025, and more than 60 people across 40 organisations, including government ministries, the University of Curaçao, the Chamber of Commerce, labour unions and NGOs such as CARMABI, were consulted.

Activities

On education specifically, the report finds MOWCS is running the island's largest digitalisation project, covering more than 25,000 users, with over 80% of primary, lower-secondary and secondary schools already connected to the internet for educational purposes. Instructors have been receiving informal awareness and laboratory training on generative-AI tools such as ChatGPT, and on how to adapt coursework around them, but Curaçao's three local universities offer no dedicated degree in AI, machine learning or data science, and about a third of the roughly 1,500-2,000 local tertiary students are enrolled in ICT-adjacent fields.

Results

The report also documents a stark STEM gender gap — male graduates outnumber female graduates seven to one in engineering, a faculty of about 150 students total — and notes that MOWCS's digitalisation project explicitly targets closing new digital-gender and socio-economic gaps as it rolls out devices and connectivity to every pupil and teacher.

Conclusions

The assessment is candid about limits: it is explicitly 'not a report card' and records no measured learning outcomes. National AI adoption across the public and private sectors is estimated at only 5-7%, Curaçao has no AI-specific transparency, liability or data-protection law, and the National AI Strategy that is meant to act on these findings was, at the time of the report, still in development.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Medium (€50k–€500k)
Time to results
Medium (1–3 years)
Staffing & skills
UNESCO Office for the Caribbean, Curaçao Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports (MOWCS), Minister Sithree van Heydoorn, 40 consulted organisations, including the University of Curaçao, the Chamber of Commerce, labour unions and NGOs such as CARMABI

Conditions for success

  • broad multi-stakeholder consultation (60+ people across 40 organisations spanning government, academia, business, labour and civil society)
  • explicit equity framing: MOWCS's digitalisation project explicitly targets closing digital-gender and socio-economic gaps
  • existing large-scale digitalisation infrastructure to build on (25,000+ users, 80%+ school connectivity)

Common failure modes

  • Curaçao has no AI-specific transparency, liability or data-protection law in force
  • the National AI Strategy meant to act on the assessment's findings was still in development at the time of the report
  • a stark STEM gender gap (7:1 male-to-female engineering graduates) is documented but not yet addressed by any measured intervention
  • overall national AI adoption is estimated at only 5-7%, indicating readiness gaps persist despite existing digital infrastructure

Where it fits

Governance type
national ministry in partnership with a UN agency
Scale
small island jurisdiction (Curaçao)
Income level
high-income small island economy

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

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Data sources

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