The Ministry of Education has formally embarked on its ambitious Guyana Online Academy of Learning (GOAL) project which will be presiding over 20,000 scholarships in five years with 4,500 to be awarded this year.
Guyanese can apply to pursue any of the over 80 programmes being offered through GOAL from five universities. These are the University of the West Indies Open Campus, the University of the Southern Caribbean (USC), the University of Applied Sciences (IUBH), the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) and the JAIN “Deemed To Be” University.
Programmes will be offered from the Certificate level up to the PhD level. The timeline for completing these programmes ranges from two months to three years, the ministry said.
Application forms are now available on the Ministry of Education’s website at www.education.gov.gy. The GOAL website is also to be launched this week to facilitate the submission of digital applications by interested persons.
Over time, more Universities are expected to come on board to provide additional programmes in various areas to Guyanese, according to the ministry.
In the advertisement announcing the programme, the government hinged it to the commitment by President Ali and the PPP/C in their manifesto for the March 2nd, 2020 general elections to grant 20,000 scholarships for online courses. Fulfilling manifesto promises – like the separate pledge of 50,000 jobs over five years – is indeed of great importance and the scholarships can no doubt expand the skills base in the country. However, awarding of the scholarships must be made within a much larger framework and one that takes account of the revenues accruing from the oil and gas industry and importantly, the multiplicity of skills that will be required for that sector.
In a letter in the April 9 edition of SN referring to the GOAL programme, E.B. John makes the point that winning a scholarship must lead to the scholar being assured of winning a suitable job. He also cited the need for a comprehensive performance appraisal system in order to measure the return on investment.
It can’t be restated enough that since the Government of Guyana will be funding these scholarships they must deliver returns to the State and to the recipients in terms of quality education and the acquisition of jobs from which a living can be made. Several commentators have already pointed out that these scholarships must be assigned based on an assessment of the country’s needs. There is no evidence of such an examination being embarked upon by the Ministry of Education prior to the announcement of the courses now available for scholarships.
The 80 programmes on offer cover a gamut of areas: ranging from a Diploma Programme in Value Added Products from Fruits and Vege-tables to a Master’s Degree Programme in Artifi-cial Intelligence. There is also a great disparity in the eligibility requirements from no formal qualifications for certificate courses to the completion of a MBBS and internship. It is unclear how the 80 programmes were selected. Was it the case that these were what were available from the various universities that the government was seeking partnership with or were these programmes specifically requested?
The government is quite keen no doubt to push on with this scholarship programme helmed by the former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Guyana, Dr Jacob Opadeyi. However, the sourcing of programmes for scholarships must take immediate cognisance of the real and future needs of the country beginning with the oil and gas industry and the reorientation of the economy that will come from petroleum dollars.
One would expect that GOAL would seek from ExxonMobil and its tier one contractors the types of skills required for their operations and the institutions of learning from where such qualifications can be earned. Those institutions should then be targeted for the awarding of online scholarships in a bid to `Guyanise’ oil and gas operations over the next thirty years. What are the types of support services the oil and gas industry is looking for? These are questions which should be attracting the attention of goal.
More difficult to anticipate is the future orientation of the economy but that, too, must be taken account of by this 20,000 scholarships programme. It will however require the adumbrating of a vision by this government of the future envisaged for Guyana. Is it that Guyana with its large land mass and arable soil will push for massive agricultural projects to supply the specific needs of the Caribbean and its neighbours? Is it that Guyana will embark on large scale agro-processing based on the projected cheaper energy? Is it that Guyana will become a hub for oil and gas services for the Guianas and Trinidad? Is it that Guyana will seek to reduce its carbon emissions by major investment in green renewables? Is it that Guyana wants to become the Bangalore of South America? The point is that the government has to deliver a vision that connects with these scholarships to be funded by the state. There is scant evidence of the advancement of any such planning in the last eight months and not even the local content legislation has been delivered.
There are any number of pitfalls in the application of the proceeds of oil revenues in a manner that generates sustainable growth and the progressive creation of higher paying jobs in the economy. In an article in yesterday’s Trinidad Guardian, economist Dr Roger Hosein presented a cautionary tale about the Twin-Island Republic whose economy he said is in dire straits.
“Between 2007 and 2021 we produced 4.379 billion barrels of oil and gas, so you would expect to see something substantial. After producing this oil and gas, we see economic activities going backwards. This bothers me deeply. So we now have an economy that is about 17 per cent lower than in 2014 and that is about 30 per cent to 40 per cent lower than in 2007,” he said.
Warning that the country is almost broke, Dr Hosein said: “We have some money in the Heritage and Stabilisation Fund (HSF). If you look at the numbers most of the money was spent on transfers and subsidies.”
Asked what could be done to help the private sector become more competitive and innovative, Dr Hosein said there is a flawed incentive structure that causes business people to import and sell goods from abroad rather than come up with new products.
“One way to change the incentive structure is to devalue the currency. I am not saying that we should devalue the currency immediately,” he said, adding that academia should work together with the business sector to develop solutions. However, it is the role of the Government to take the lead in reforming the economy, he added.
The offering of these online scholarships is commendable. It must however intersect with the arc of development which is the government’s responsibility to imagine and shape.