Targeting the wrong people to collect taxes

Apr 13, 2017 Letters

Dear Editor,
We are truly experiencing a nauseating rigmarole with public and private education together with the issue of VAT on private education. As the present situation gets more intriguing and ridiculous, we are kind of confused about our schools’ curricula and delivery aspects. However, we tend to agree that ‘informal education, a curriculum is the planned interaction of pupils with instructional content, materials, resources, and processes for evaluating the attainment of educational objectives’. From our own experiences as parents and guardians, we are baffled that in the public schools, pupils who have reached Grades 6+ cannot recognize words, much less read. Added to this undesirable situation, in Mathemathics some cannot count, add, subtract, etc. In Science and other subject areas, it is even more pathetic.
The present adverse situation is more common in our public school system. We have tried phonics to remedy the situation, exposing older students whose lips have all become lazy and tongues that are tight after years of little use. In other subject areas, we have spent a lot of time and effort, employing retired teachers to salvage the boat with little or no relief. Our education personnel have all pontificated on these matters but we are getting nowhere. Then comes the proliferation of private schools which are making inroads to address the unhealthy situations. Most of the students who attend these private schools come from families who have lost confidence in the public school system and are now being hammered and insulted further by VAT on private education.
What the private schools are achieving is the realization that the schools’ curricula exist in the experiences of the children while in the public schools, the curricula exist in books. Private schools teach each child so the child experiences the learning and internalizes the concepts taught. In the public schools, teachers preach just like they are in church, children are not meaningfully occupied, teachers are on Facebook and the internet most of the time. These teachers only teach after school at their extra-lessons and parents and guardians become the milking cows who give tax-free dollars to these teachers. To compound the situation, the education officials are not au fait with what is happening in the field since all they demand is the production of reports which gather dust on the shelves of the Ministry of Education. They do not walk the talk or manage by wandering around, and are paid to warm their seats in the offices.
If these public schools are not paying their taxes, then what is the GRA and National Accreditation Council doing? They take action against these schools rather than burdening the people with VAT on education. Are our administrators so backward that they are targeting the wrong people for the failure to pay taxes? Or is this an easier way to shylock some more flesh from citizens?
Ed Singh

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News