Students take a break at Kingston College, rated C+. -Rudolph Brown photo
Glenda Anderson, Staff Reporter
EDUCATION OFFICERS, who have taken over the job of the early school inspectors, say the job of maintaining standards among the island's institutions is becoming increasingly burdensome, and a cause for concern.
"I am worried because it (the workload) is too much, much too much," said Mary Nichols, president of the Jamaica Association of Education Officers. She represents 267 officers who cover six regions. "My core duty is to visit all schools in my region. In this region (six), there are 95 schools, which means visiting with 125 counsellors. If there isn't a guidance counsellor I'm supposed to interact with a family life counsellor. Bear in mind (though) that the standard is that no education officer should be supervising more than 20 schools."
The group has been feeling the heat, especially as the Education Ministry has implemented sweeping changes following recommendations from two Government-commissioned reviews KPMG (1998) and 2000.
A Strategic Performance Review conducted by KPMG (1998) found the ratio of education officers to schools islandwide ranged from a high of 51 schools to one officer to a low of six to one.
Today, the ratio of an average of 20:1 is still high, but there are no plans to increase the number of officers.
LACK OF PRESENCE
Still faced with increasing levels of indiscipline, violence in schools and questions of poor quality in the teaching/learning process recently, the group has been rapped for a seeming invisibility in the education system.
"With not enough officers in the system you tend to focus on areas of weakness, so it is a fact that sometimes, especially in the well-run schools, the officers are not as visible as in a weaker school," said Adelle Brown, chief education officer.
She says despite this, there are no plans to increase the number of officers as resources will not allow.
Since the start of the year, 121 schools (of approximately 900 islandwide) were visited, while last year 98 per cent of the 119 schools visited met the standards and above. Twenty-one schools were identified as weak or very weak.
"Based on our capacity that's good," Ms. Brown said.
The review found, too, that the Ministry's target of a four-year cycle of inspection was "neither achieved nor achievable." It suggested, instead, that panel inspections be conducted "throughout the year, to allow more to take place", that written reports which were often submitted several months late by officers be submitted within six weeks of every inspection, and that principals and school boards be charged with the responsibility of devising action plans and implementing recommendations.
In addition, the review found that general recordkeeping, teacher deployment, teacher productivity and capability, as well as the management capability of principals, were repeat problem areas.
All fall within the purview of education officers.
MORE PERSONS ON TEAM
Since then, however, there have been changes.
"We've repositioned and revised the panel inspection programme. We now have more external persons on the team. We've revised the methods, and now focus on school improvements. Inspections are now standardised, with a prescribed inspection manual and within eight weeks the schools ought to receive the reports of their inspections," Ms. Brown said.
There are no penalties for non-compliance.
"We encourage and persuade and monitor the action plans, but the penalty is really the perception of the schools in the communities, which is a very important thing in the eyes of the school," she said.
In addition, there are plans to make public the reports of various schools as early as the next two years.
Schools are now visited by a panel of inspectors between November to May of each year. Some are done routinely with priority given to schools based on weaknesses observed, with schools notified at least eight weeks beforehand.
Responding to the issue of the Ministry's implementation of the recommendations of reports submitted, Mrs. Brown said, "It's not every last weakness that will be addressed but it is really the responsibility of the regions and professional development unit to address wide-scale weaknesses. They have been doing that but clearly we would like to see more of it being done."
Ms. Nichols was critical of the non-implementation of recommendations. She said although clear recommendations are given, education officers have no enforcement authority.
"Monthly reports are submitted, recommendations and a list of options are also submitted but often they are just ignored," Ms. Nichols said.
She said in some instances the authority of education officers is often side-stepped by some school boards and principals who often bypass recommendations or outrightly breach the standard school code.
