With 45 years in the teaching profession, Gem Rohlehr A.A., is a ‘Special Person’

Nov 17, 2019 News, Special Person

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Pull quote: “We mould the nation. That is the motto. And if we are moulding the nation then we need to go beyond ourselves.”

By Kemol King

Gem Ann Rohlehr-Vogt, more popularly known as Gem Rohlehr, is an educator, musician, wife, and mother of many. Many leaders across the country and abroad can attest to her role as a guardian of the state and a protector of children. That’s why Kaieteur News has chosen her to be this week’s special person.

With 45 years in the teaching profession, most of that being at Queen’s College, Rohlehr doesn’t exactly need an introduction. Her reputation precedes her.
Kaieteur News sat down with Rohlehr for a candid interview about what made her the woman she is today.
UPBRINGING
She grew up in the city. Her great grandparents and one of her grandparents were from Berbice.
“So Rohlehr is a Berbician name,” she chuckled. “But I was born here in Georgetown.”
Rohlehr related how she came from a family of strict values, where excellence wasn’t just a norm, it was a requirement. In her Adventist family, she grew up very committed to her faith, and remains so to this day.
As a little girl, Rohlehr went to a little Russell Street kindergarten known as the Kate Douglas School, where she’d go back to teach, years later, when she came of age. There, Rohlehr said, the Headmistress challenged students to go to the top schools in the country.
After that, she went to a private school, the Georgetown Adventists Academy.

The schools now seen as top schools, from Queen’s College to The Bishops’ High School were still run by the Anglican Church, and would continue to be until the late 1930s.
At the time, Dolphin had a primary aspect, and a secondary one that went up to form four, Rohlehr said.
“So you were expected to go there to write your common entrance.”
Rohlehr later attended the aforementioned private school, as her mom had chosen.
According to Rohlehr, her peers would have said that she loved mathematics, but the teenage student preferred English Language, Literature and History.
“I loved History; I was very good at History. In fact, History is my minor that I took at the University of Guyana. And I also was in love with Human Biology.”
Queen’s College was an all-male school, while The Bishops’ High School was an all-female institution.
Rohlehr wouldn’t have much exposure to it until when she’d need to use the laboratories there to focus on her science subjects.
But academics were not her only focus. Her school believed in students being well-rounded. That meant she had to champion the core subjects that all schools were expected to do, and extra-curricular activities.
Rohlehr, for instance, was in the choir as a child. Even today, she is revered for her contribution to music. She recalled that the choir she formed part of would perform in December at a hall on D’urban Street.
Then, when she wasn’t singing, she was involved in literature and poetry.
“Poetry was the thing of the day for even older people. They would stand up at weddings and they would repeat a 12-verse poem… so you had to do poetry.” she laughed.
After high school, the young adult Rohlehr took a brief break before she started out to college.
Her family had had intentions for her to study medical sciences and become a doctor, like her great grandfather, Dr. John Rohlehr. She recalled that he was so impressive a man that Walter Rodney wrote about him.

“That’s why I did Chemistry, Biology and Human Biology.”
Pursuant to that, Rohlehr had applied to study in England. But after England honoured her application, her family started to worry about whether England would be too far away for their hearts to take. There was also the question of affordability.
After eventually deciding against that, she had applied to Jamaica. And when Jamaica honoured her application, the same worries arose.
It seems as though things worked out just as Rohlehr needed them to, because she said that she knew very early on that she wanted to teach. It helped as well that there were teachers in her family.
So she went on to study at the teacher’s training college, where she was taught to teach English, Literature and Social Studies to s

tudents up to Form 3.
CAREER
Her teaching career started out at the very kindergarten she attended as a child, for a brief stint. She then taught at Dolphin from 1974 to 1988. Earlier known as the Broad Street Government School, Dolphin was the only government school around for a few years, starting from 1932. There, she had written the school’s hymn.
Later, the teacher received a letter from the Government, suggesting that she teach at Queen’s College.
“I spent three months before making that decision.”
She had worried about whether Dolphin would suffer if she left, but she eventually decided to transfer.
There wasn’t that much of a difference between the two schools, Rohlehr related.
“Both were strong in music. There is not a great difference…Dolphin is the first government school and the influence of persons [is shared]. For example, the Dolphin Government school is named after the Dolphin family.”
“[Queen’s College’s] music room is named after the daughter Dolphin.”
By the time she transferred to Queen’s College, it had already been a co-educational learning institution for over a decade.
In her many years at Guyana’s top school, the Woolley House teacher taught many subjects, and served as Principal. She was keen to note that, in 2014, she released a book for the school’s 170th anniversary titled ‘Snippets’. That booklet focused on recognizing the contributions of females to the school, with special focus on the Principals and other heads.
She would teach music every now and then, and is heavily involved with the classical style school’s choir.
Apart from the voice, she plays the recorder and the violin.
“Consistently, I would teach Communication Studies, Advanced Literature, English and Literature. I have done Theatre Arts when they did not have a Theatre Arts teacher and when the Department of History had collapsed, I spent three years guiding the History department.”
Rohlehr has also been participating in the tour club; taking it about Guyana, Barbados and Trinidad & Tobago.
Not only did she teach at those schools, but she has lectured at the University of Guyana.
“At the university, I’ve lectured in music, English Language, Storytelling, and Literature.”
She has served the Caribbean at the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC), supervising teachers in the marking of English Literature, and shaping the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) Literature syllabus in Jamaica.
“I was also the head of the Guyana Teachers’ Union (GTU) Women’s Advisory Committee. If you go there, you’ll see my photograph on the wall. I hope they still have it,” Rohlehr said, smiling.
“That permitted me to go to Essequibo, the East Coast of Demerara and Berbice to give lectures.”
AWARDS
Rohlehr has acquired certificates in music and singing, and has a diploma in voice from the UK-based Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM).
Even though she topped the music festival in 2009 and got an award in 2010 for her contribution to teaching and music, Rohlehr said “I’m looking for a little higher.”
It all goes to her striving for excellence and her goal of developing children, as well as adapting with the shifting nature of that goal as society evolves.
Asked whether she considers herself great, Rohlehr responded “Not really, you know.”
“It is natural in my family to strive for excellence. They expect it.”
After all, she reflected that it is genetics and her childhood which led to her achieving many feats.
In 2017, she was bestowed a National Award by President David Granger. She said that, as it was being pinned on her, she thought it should have gone to her grandparents, who also displayed excellence throughout their lives.
Perhaps, John Rohlehr, who was a great doctor, should have received it, she thought.
It could have gone to her grandfather, a great headmaster; her grandmother, who was a teacher; her father, who served in the military; or her mother, who loved history, and was crafty with her hands.
“… My great aunts, one of them, we called Mother and she was a teacher. Everybody had to respect her because she was the matriarch.”
But it went to her.
For all that Rohlehr has achieved, she’s thankful for the fact that she got the opportunity to do what she loves.
For some parents, when they say that a child has to take one path, that’s the path they have to take.
These days, it is a bit easier to choose your own path, Rohlehr said.
MUCH MORE TO GIVE
Asked whether she intends to retire any time soon, Rohlehr seemed to frown.
“When one retires, you’re saying that that person can’t give anymore and that’s like killing them,” she posited.
Retirement age is 55, and she’d say that that’s the age where someone meets their peak.
“I have a Master’s in Education. But a few months ago, I gained a Master of Arts in Philosophy. And I have read that persons in their 70s – and I’m not there,” she said, laughing, “they can have active minds, just like a young person.”
She recalled that there was a lecturer at UG who came from the United States. He was 92 and could still proffer a wealth of knowledge.
“So really, in teaching, you are learning and sometimes, you learn more than you teach… To cut someone off specifically [because of their age] it would affect the next generation.”
Rohlehr is certain that even now, there is a lot more that she can give.
DISCIPLINE
“Schools do not run on their own…Plato says that when you’re training, you are training persons to be guardians of the state. [That] and political leaders.”
One former headmaster, Clarence Trotz, used to say that a child cannot learn well if that child is not disciplined.
“That’s one of the mottos the teachers work with. We never allowed students to come into the staff room. Last week, a student came who was here years ago. He said ‘But miss, how [can] these children come into the staff room like this?’”
Teachers have to cope with those changes, Rohlehr said, because it’s about preparing the children for the evolving world of work.
Rohlehr noted that society has changed a lot from when she was younger. Even the culture of the school has evolved a lot from when she taught there in her early years.
She related that the school would get complaints from leaders in the business community and other sectors, who would say that the behaviour of the youths coming out of the school is changing.
“The child is away from home for long periods and so there must be somebody who is taking care of the child. They’re meeting with other children and they have various beliefs and behaviours.”
Rohlehr said that coming from a disciplined family, she had had friends in school that did many uncanny things.
“I don’t know if that has influenced me,” she chuckled.
Despite what she would call a moral decline in society, she continues to maintain a culture of discipline in her teaching, in order to shape her students’ moral character. To her, discipline is what moulds leaders.
Rohlehr has a reputation as a strict educator. One student described her as full of spirit.
“We mould the nation. That is the motto. And if we are moulding the nation then we need to go beyond ourselves.” The child comes from a home, said Rohlehr. That means that when a parent becomes a parent, there are things they must put away so that they can pay attention to the upbringing of another human being, she instructed.
Rohlehr took the opportunity to send a spirited message to parents.
“The advice that I would give is that the parent must continue learning, even though they may not have been qualified academically. There are places to which they can go and achieve… They must continue learning so that they can teach at home. They must continue telling their children stories because we learnt from stories in the whole shaping process.”

 

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