Uniform voucher distribution kicks off in Berbice

Jun 23, 2011 News

More than 29,000 uniform vouchers have been distributed to head teachers of nursery, primary and secondary schools in Region Six on Friday at the Berbice High School auditorium. The presentation was made on Tuesday.
Also present at the distribution were Regional Education Officer, Mrs Shafiran Bhajan, and Guyana Teachers’ Union President, Colin Bynoe.
Regional Chairman Zulfikar Mustapha, addressing the head teachers, told them that the government learnt much about the uniform voucher distribution process in 2010 and has taken steps to ensure a smoother operation this time around.

Some head teachers in Region Six present at the uniform voucher distribution

He noted that the programme had been moved from the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security directly to the Education Ministry, with the schools spearheading the effort.
Mustapha added that the project this year costs $42M and urged head teachers to ensure that each child is given a voucher, even if the head teachers have to call the students’ homes to go and collect.
The vouchers are 25 in each booklet. He said that last year head teachers need to ensure that the undistributed vouchers and stubs be handed in to the Chief Accountant of the Ministry of Education by July 29.
He said there must be accountability for every single voucher. “We should be honest enough. If we can have the extra there, we can send it to other parts of the country. Class teachers are to complete the voucher spreadsheet with the parents’ signatures,” he said.
Schools also erred last year in completing a spreadsheet which contained the names and signatures of parents who collected vouchers.
He urged the schools to be accountable. “We’re having some problems with some heads in terms of accountability.
We will have a whole day discussion on that another time,” he added.
Vouchers distribution began in each school yesterday and will continue until July 8 when the first phase of the project ends.
A second phase will begin from July 11, in case any student would not have collected during Phase One. All vouchers are to be stamped by the head teacher and signed, or they would not be accepted in the stores.
Parents’ identification card numbers must be attached to the vouchers in order to stamp out the selling of the vouchers. He said that parents turn up at some stores with several vouchers and that is unfair.
Head teachers were also told by Mr Mustapha to submit a comprehensive report to the Department of Education in New Amsterdam.
These reports should include all the pertinent details about who received and did not receive vouchers and reasons why some parents would not have collected their vouchers.
They may not have been interested or just did not turn up to collect the voucher.
Mustapha told the head teachers that he was disturbed to receive information about the school-feeding programme that the juices and biscuits were being removed from some schools, especially on the Corentyne and were found being sold in shops.
He said $15.1M is being spent each month on the school-feeding programme in primary and nursery schools across Region Six.
“But sometimes what we notice is that many times colleagues have told me that when they went to certain places, they are finding these things giving for snacks. They are not going to the schools and the children are not receiving them.
He said that recently several boxes of Topco Juice were removed from a Corentyne school storeroom.