Invigilators in Linden not yet paid

Aug 30, 2013 News

– Official says increases stalled process

As the new school year commences in a few days, invigilators for several examinations held in Linden are complaining of not being paid for their labour.
More than 70 of them, Kaieteur News was told, have not received payments for invigilating the National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA); the National Grade Nine Assessment (third form examinations); Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC); and the Linden Technical Institute (LTI)’s examinations.
Several of them explained that while some persons have been paid for invigilating the NGSA, their travel allowances are still pending.
The invigilators, most of whom are single mothers, told this newspaper that they are frustrated, since many of them are dependent on the payments, to get their children prepared for school.
According to them, over the past several weeks, continuous enquiries have been made to the Region’s Education Office regarding the payments, but they (the invigilators) are always told that the cheques are not ready.
“I fed up. How long can we bear up with this? We have children to send to school. They can’t be putting us in this all de time suh, it ain’t right. I hear Guyana done top de region again, and the invigilators played a part, suh they should treat us with respect. We shouldn’t gah fuh be begging fuh wha we wuk for,” one single mother said.
She added too, that she was hopeful that payments would be made before the new school year starts, since she has not yet been able to purchase school supplies for her four children.
“I did really hoping that we woulda get de money early, because I have four children to send to school…the money I working for now, barely buying food. Wha I gon tell me kids when they ask fuh books and pencils? They got to do something. It still ain’t too late, if dem give we we money tomorrow (today) we could still buy school things,” the woman added.
A supervising invigilator for 30 years expressed that “it’s about high time they pay us our money, and stop prolonging the payments…is years now this happening.”
The woman recalled that a few years ago, she received payments on ‘Old Year’s Day,’ for invigilating CSEC examinations earlier that year, in March.
“This is nothing new, but it still doesn’t make it right. These children already collect their results and everything, so why we can’t get paid up to now. Anybody would want to work and not be paid? Come on man, they owe me close to $200,000, and I still can’t get it,” the woman said.
Another invigilator recalled that one year, her friend, a single mother burst into tears two days before Christmas Eve when she was told that the cheques were not ready, “because she needed the money to make Christmas for her children”. “It was sad, I felt it for her,” the invigilator said.
She added that the job of being an invigilator is more than giving out exam papers and monitoring for cheating. They also had unofficial duties such as counseling nervous candidates, she said.
Meanwhile, when contacted yesterday, the Regional Education Officer of Region 10, Marcia Andrews, told Kaieteur News that the payments are being processed. She explained that the cheques were pulled back in order to facilitate an increase in the payments.
“We had to do that because there was a raise. The supervising invigilators, who used to get $1000, are now getting $1200, and the regular invigilators are getting $900 as opposed to $800. These things take time,” Andrews stressed.
She added, however, that the payments are likely to be issued early next week.

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