Mahdia Primary cries out against “massive” shortage of supplies

Sep 21, 2013 News

A severe shortage of school items at the Mahdia Primary School, Region Eight, has resulted in the school’s Parent Teacher Association (PTA) raising concerns and linking poor performance of students to the absence of the pertinent learning materials.
The matters, which ranged from the school receiving a short supply of textbooks to a short supply of toilet paper, were the topic of discussion at the recently held PTA meeting.

A section of the Mahdia Primary School

Among the shortages was the absence of compact disc (CD) recordings of the Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI) Mathematics programme, and the Broadcast to Schools radio programmes.
Since the Mahdia Primary School, like other schools in the interior, cannot access the radio channel on which the programmes are aired, they are provided with recordings of the lessons on CDs from the National Centre for Education and Resource Development (NCERD).
NCERD’s Director, Jennifer Cumberbatch, said that for schools in hinterland areas, the CDs would either be delivered from NCERD to the Regional Education Officer (REDO) who then delivers them to the primary schools; or they would be uplifted from NCERD by an officer who had travelled out of the region.
Still, the reason why the Mahdia Primary School had not yet received the CDs could not be identified. Cumberbatch noted that the school should have already received the CDs six months ago. She said that the CDs were delivered in March to the REDO serving at that time.
The situation has reportedly been the subject of much criticism and is often blamed for poor performances in the various subject areas, since questions from the Government prepared assessments are often times drawn from material that were discussed on the radio programme.
“It is already three weeks into the school year and the children have not been able to listen to even one session of the programme. They are behind. They were supposed to start from day one,” a source said.
It was noted, too, that not only are the CDs absent, but the workbooks that go along with them are in short supply. It was reported that in one Grade, where 70 students are registered, only 39 workbooks were received.
The current REDO, Rabindra Singh, acknowledged that the office is aware of the absence of the materials. He promised that efforts are being made to acquire them.
Regional Executive Officer, Ronald Harsawack, after confirming Singh’s statements, added that a member of the office travelled out of the region yesterday and was assigned to uplift the outstanding items from NCERD. He said that since the staff is expected during the course of the weekend, the Primary School will likely receive the instructional CDs on Monday.
Apart from the absence of the instructional CDs, there was mention of a number of other contributing factors that deter the smooth flow of the Mahdia Primary School.
Among these factors were reports of the fuel shortage in the region affecting the day to day activities at the school; nonpayment of the janitor; and even a shortage of teachers.
It was reported that while one teacher should be assigned to teach 25 students; at Mahdia Primary, some teachers are assigned to classes that contain as many as 71 students.
Further, much emphasis was placed on the “massive” shortage of office and janitorial supplies at the school. It was noted that the supplies that are received by the Department of Education for the region are “vastly inadequate” and cannot be expected to last for the entire 15 weeks of a school term.
According to a document seen by this newspaper, the school receives 10 sheets of cardboard, one bottle of glue, one pair of scissors and one meter ruler among other office items in similar quantity. These supplies are reportedly intended to serve 11 classes.
As for janitorial supplies, the document recorded four bottles of liquid cleaning agents, one bucket of soap powder and two rolls of toilet tissue.
It was reported that the quantity of toilet paper supplies is especially worrying since after the toilet paper is used up, students would resort to pulling pages from their exercise books to be used as a substitute.
Commenting on the issue, the REO said that while he acknowledges that the items supplied are short, it is the budget that caters for them.
He explained that the funds that are allocated to the region are used to provide supplies to 26 schools, and as such the quantity of items may not meet demands.
“Whatever we receive, that is what we can procure. While we would want to give every single school everything that they need, budget does not allow us to do that,” he said.