Minister in the Ministry of Education Dr Desrey Fox says that greater emphasis will be placed on the education of children with special needs and the Ministry is working to ensure that all of them are exposed to schooling at the secondary level.
She further stated that the Ministry recognised that this was a challenging task which required the building of specially equipped schools and the training of teachers. Dr Fox was speaking on Thursday at the fourth `Face the Community’ meeting at the South Ruimveldt Secondary School.
She also highlighted that the Ministry was looking to put more resources into schools in the hinterland since several there did not have the same resources as those on the coast. She, however, said that the Ministry would also be focusing on the schools in Georgetown and other areas that did not have adequate resources.
One of the plans, she said, was for greater focus on the teaching of technical subjects in the schools. As a result, the ministry has employed a specialist to oversee the agriculture programme in schools. Fox added that technical education provided an opportunity for those students who were not inclined to the academic subjects to find a niche for themselves.
The Minister also appealed to teachers to educate students within a cultural context. She told the gathering, that as a linguist, she valued the importance of an individual’s language since it was a part of their identity. She said that English should also be taught as a second language and not be seen as an exercise to correct an individual’s bad speech.
Flooding
When the parents were invited to share their concerns, one of the main issues raised was the flooding of the school yards whenever there was any considerable amount of rainfall. This was highlighted as a major problem at the South Ruimveldt Secon-dary and St. Christopher’s Nursery Schools. Dr. Fox stated that the PTAs and the Ministry could work together to solve the problem.
Deputy Mayor of George-town, Robert Williams, who was present at the meeting in his capacity of Chairman of the South Ruimveldt School Board, promised that he would visit the nursery school to see how best the problem could be corrected.
Meanwhile, another hotly contested issue was the assertion made by a member of the South Ruimveldt Board, that there was no equitable distribution of teachers and that the school had several vacancies for teachers which had not been answered for years. He stated that this was having a negative effect on the school, since only 17 children were preparing to write the 2009 CSEC examinations in comparison to 34 students who wrote the exam this year.
In response, Acting Assistant Chief Education Officer (Secondary Schools), Melcita Bovell said that she had met with a number of Head Teachers and had asked them to itemise their staff shortages. But she said that she never received any correspondence. She explained that the Ministry was willing to employ third year students of the University of Guyana to fill the vacancies had they been communicated. The member of the Board insisted that the Head Teacher had communicated to the Ministry several times but Bovell said that she never received any of these letters.
Neil Chase, the President of the St. Christopher Nursery School, said that he was happy that the Ministry of Education had organised such a forum and said he was optimistic that several of the concerns raised would be addressed. He was particularly interested in having the issue with flooding of schools in the south Georgetown area solved quickly.
