If the media is to be trusted by the public, they must strive to be both accurate and truthful in their reporting and fair in their commentary. The opening paragraph of your (Nassau Guardian) editorial on School Repairs on Wednesday, August 30, 2006, failed on both counts.
It is inaccurate for you to say it makes no difference which party is the government insofar as school repairs are concerned. And it was wrong for you to apply a broad editorial brush equating the present government’s failed effort to maintain and upgrade the government-operated school plant with the record of the Free National Movement when in office. Nothing could be further from the truth. School re-openings since September 2002, have been plagued with confusion arising from delayed summer repair programmes, late transfers of some teaching staff, acute teacher shortages, particularly in the Family Islands, and issuance of misinformation by the Ministry to parents and students.
Indeed, since 2002, it has not been unusual for students to be required to attend school amid ongoing construction work, this year being worse than most others. A review of your own reporting of September school re-opening between 1992 and 2001 would reveal the stark contrast between what exists today and what occurred on the Free National Movement’s watch.
By: The Free National Movement
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A modern school or a good school?
Please allow me space to comment on your recent front page story “Minister on a Mission.”
Without seeming ungrateful, I would like to comment on Ministers Sears and Roberts’ mission to Abaco to sign contracts and take on “the mammoth task of bringing all schools up to the ‘state of the art’ level.” With all due respect, I would like to point out that NO child has ever received a quality education from a “state of the art” building!
Amy Roberts Primary on Green Turtle Cay, is one of the Abaco schools going through the “renewal, rebuilding and modernisation” to make the “environ more conducive to teaching and learning.” Basically, what is being done at the school is that an existing office, staff area, staff bathroom and kitchen are being turned into a classroom. A separate kitchen is also being built! (This rebuilding and renewal makes it next to impossible to create another classroom in the future.)
Tens of thousands of dollars must be used to finance these renovations and the opening of school has now been postponed until September 11. (Not faulting the contractor, just a lot of work to be done in a short time.) My child will be in the sixth grade at Amy Roberts Primary this school year. For four of the six years he has attended this school, he has been in a combined class. This year, when he is preparing for GLAT’s and for entry into a secondary school, his sixth grade class has to be combined with the fifth grade!
There are four teachers at this school, including the principal, who must teach a grade (or two) along with executing his/her administrative duties, There are no teacher’s aides, no art, music or computer teachers. Amy Roberts Primary shares a Physical Education and a Spanish teacher with Treasure Cay Primary. These teachers are at Amy Roberts Primary one day each week! I realise that this is not the only school in the country with combined classes. I have voiced my concern about the combined class to ministry officials and I have been told that it is the policy of the Ministry of Education to assign teachers according to the number of students in the school. Amy Roberts Primary, with less than 80 students, does not qualify for more teachers! But here we are spending millions of dollars to make “state of the art” schools, where grades will still be combined and teachers will be overburdened and stressed. This can’t be considered an atmosphere conducive to learning! This is not making the “same resources available” to our children that are available to those in the city. I think there is something wrong with this picture!
While I can appreciate that my child will be attending school in a modern building, I would be just as pleased to have him in a basic, clean, safe classroom, with a teacher assigned to only his grade. And to have an art, music and computer teacher, would be the icing on the cake! There is a huge difference between a house and a home as there is a huge difference between a modern building and a good school.
By: Annabelle Cross from The Nassau Guardian
