Canadian Director says... Under-educated teachers assigned to work with special needs children

Canadian Director says… Under-educated teachers assigned to work with special needs children

Jul 19, 2008 News

“Arguably, you have the most undereducated teachers working with the hardest to educate population of students,” said Canadian Paraplegic Association’s (CPA) Executive Director, David Hinton.
Hinton opined that while there are students who have special needs, many of the teachers in Guyana have special needs themselves.
The official was addressing the closing stages of one aspect of the CPA project, on Thursday.
Guyana has been adapting well to the expertise which the body has been able to provide.
In terms of students with special needs, Hinton explained that in Guyana, the real statistics on how many children have special needs are unknown.
“Parents, for socio-societal reasons, don’t admit that their children have special needs,” Hinton said.
He recounted a story of a 15-year-old boy on the East Bank of Demerara who attended school for the first time last September. His parents had apparently not allowed him to go to school because he is a midget. It appears that the boy’s parents were so embarrassed by what they perceived was a disability they did not allow him to attend school. Hinton said that the boy is quite articulate and refreshingly funny.
According to Hinton, the real tragedy for Guyana would be for persons like the aforementioned boy not to receive a good education and later enjoy gainful employment.
He said that the project was immensely successful. Some of the successes were listed as the strengthening of the National Commission on Disability (NCD) with regard to their ability to deliver information and in building up its resource library.
Hinton explained that the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA)-funded project had a dual purpose. The first function was to bring down some of the expertise of the CPA from Canada to Guyana, and share it with the local populace. The CPA has been in existence for over 65 years, and over this period of time, it has gained considerable expertise, Hinton informed.
The second part of the project involves giving the visiting Canadians some hands-on experience and knowledge of what life is like in Guyana. For the duration of the exercise, 14 Canadians have been brought here, and Hinton stated assuredly that every one of them will leave with “a marked difference on how they view things”.
There may be a three-year project in the cards for students with special needs, said Hinton. While the possible project was still in its early stages and has not yet been approved, Hinton said that if Guyana wants to move towards an integrated school system where children with disabilities co-exist with students without disabilities, special needs teachers would need to be trained.
An important point which Hinton raised was that everything could not be done all at once. He stressed that things take time. Apart from teachers being trained, he expressed the need for infrastructure at schools. Students with mobility problems are in many cases unable to attend classes in the upper floors of their respective schools.
The Ministry of Education has already recognized that there is a problem, Hinton said. He added that while they are trying to address it, his hope is that the CPA would be able to assist.
Hinton noted that the transportation system in Guyana would need to be sensitized and modified to accommodate persons living with disabilities. For example, he recounted, the CPA while operating in Trinidad and Tobago helped improve that country’s transport system to better accommodate persons living with disabilities.
He admitted that Guyana has been making improvements over the years.
Hinton said that it has been particularly encouraging to him that he has seen much more will in Guyanese living with disabilities. “Where there is a will, there is a way.”

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