Latest update September 17th, 2026 10:25 AM
Most schools’ road safety patrols inactive – Council
Despite the increasing occurrences of accidents on the roadways, most schools’ road safety patrols that received formal training and are equipped with road safety instruments remain inactive.
This is according to Romona Doorgen, Co-ordinator, Guyana National Road Safety Council.
She stressed that the Council is disappointed with this situation and is calling for those inactive schools’ patrols to become operational.
To propel this, the body is launching a schools’ road safety patrols’ competition at the beginning of Road Safety Month (November). For this year’s competition, the schools will be judged for their everyday performances as patrol outfits on the roadways, as opposed to previous years when they were essentially judged on a parade activity, in the form of a march past.
She stated that all participating primary and secondary schools will be observed by judges at random to ensure they are executing their duties effectively. Prizes will be awarded for the best uniformed patrols, best co-ordinated, best overall patrol, and best road safety patrol teacher, Doorgen revealed.
The Council wants to make this a quarterly event to ensure the patrols remain active. However, to have these patrols active and ready for the competition, the recently trained volunteers and police ranks from the Traffic Department of the various districts will have to work with the schools. In addition, the volunteers will be responsible for the patrols.
Moreover, as mandated by the Ministry of Home Affairs, the police and the Council will have to conduct lectures on a monthly basis with the schools and submit reports. She noted that the lectures have begun, but the monthly sessions will commence in November.
Doorgen asserted that the Council will be approaching the Parent Teacher Associations for their support.
With these measures in place, the body is hoping that the schools will not present any more excuses justifying the inactivity of their road safety patrols. The small stature of the students, and trained students leaving the schools, were some of the excuses cited.
Doorgen emphasised that those excuses should not have been given in the first instance since in every school that has a road safety patrol, a teacher was exposed to training. That teacher is expected to be with the students.
In addition, a manual was given to the schools, which is a good tool to train students. Further, the Council and the traffic ranks are always available to execute training whenever necessary.
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