Education CEO urges speedy implementation of policies

Dec 30, 2011 News

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“There is an overriding recognition now that our students in our schools, every single one of them, have to be at the forefront of all of our initiatives and at a greater level than they have ever been.”  This is the conviction of Chief Education Officer, Olato Sam, who recently told educators that the Ministry of education is at the point where quite a bit has been done to address a number of the policy related issues, including restructuring in various areas that hadn’t been ever considered from a policy procedural perspective.

According to Sam, the Ministry has in fact spent a few years aiming to get this process right, revealing that “last time I checked, I think there were about 15 policy areas that we would have addressed and streamlined over the last three years. That having been done, it is important for us to take the next step and get into the implementation dimension; get into the classrooms and speak with our teachers, parents and students and ensure that at the end of the day, every single student has a greater chance for academic success…” Sam said.
Alluding to additional work on the part of the Ministry to foster academic success and by extension development of the education sector, Sam pointed to the importance of showing        that everything done in the sector reflects the need for a change in a significant way.
Sam’s disclosures were made even as he sought o amplify the newly introduced initiative by recently appointed Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand, which according to him, is centered around the improved performance of students at the secondary level. He pointed to the fact that while last year saw the Ministry moving to have education professionals seeking to recommit to help bolster performance at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate Examination, “this year we are taking it to another level. We are taking a giant leap forward in relation to this particular initiative…”
The new initiative saw a number of schools being selected to participate in a pilot project which is geared at realizing improved results at the upcoming CSEC Examination, particularly in the areas of Mathematics and English. The move represents a four-party collaboration, inclusive of teachers, parents, government and students.
And according to Sam, the schools included were specially selected for well thought-out reasons; among them the fact that they all have been delivering good performances in recent times.
“We are doing this largely because we believe that this will work; we know it will work if you (teachers) buy in and come on board and we get your full support…”
“We as educators know our own potentials, we as educators sometimes get so caught up in our quotidian lives or day to day existence that oftentimes we don’t get a chance to step back and reflect on the bigger picture.”
The Chief Education Officer is of the firm belief that reflection is essential if educators are to be able to see the bigger picture, the national agenda or the regional significance, adding that “this is bigger than all of us as individuals and it can be a part of something as part of our national development.”
Just recently Minister Manickchand introduced her ambitious plan to reverse a disturbing trend in  education, which according to her, allows for “text books to be either in Central Georgetown or in stores in the different Regions but not in the children’s hands.” This state of affairs, the Minister described as “unacceptable, and I don’t believe a lot of energy needs to be expended to fix it and I certainly don’t believe this is something that we should be fixing every month.” Minister Manickchand also made reference to the delayed availability of lab chemicals and other materials, which according to some teachers have been hindering their teaching efforts. This dilemma, she assured, will become a thing of the past in a matter of months.
The Minister’s remarks were forthcoming even as she addressed a cluster meeting of teachers drawn from Taymouth Manor to Good Hope on the Essequibo Coast during a visit to Region Two. She pointed out that there are times at the Ministry that “we are not the most effective people; you send things to us and they sit on somebody’s desk. We are not going to be doing those kinds of things anymore.”
According to the Minister, there is an urgent need for efficiency in the Ministry and by extension the public school system which would allow more focus to be directed to bigger things “like how we are going to improve our Mathematics grades or how we can have our entire country become capable of reading and matching subjects and verbs…These are real issues that face us and we are expecting that you (teachers) deliver in the classroom your best, so that at the end of the day the reason you teach will be realized – that children would be productive citizens.”
Alluding to the teaching profession as “an almost frightening job”, the Minister pointed to the fact that teachers are entrusted with moulding the minds of children and therefore are charged with determining what they become. “Here you have a classroom of children and it could be very overwhelming…”
However, she noted that there are positive sides to the teaching profession, as teachers are the ones who are entrusted with the task of determining what Guyana would look like in the future. “That is a huge responsibility and I believe you are ready to honour the challenges that present themselves because you are in the profession,” the Minister noted.

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