COMMONWEALTH COUNTRIES represented by their education ministers at a conference in Edinburgh, Scotland have agreed on a structured system of recruitment of teachers from their territories.
The agreement dubbed the 'Common-wealth Teacher Recruitment Protocol', establishes that before any hiring attempt is conducted, the recruiting country must inform the source territory so that a consensus can be reached on the process of recruitment as well as the number of teachers who will be involved.
According to Maxine Henry-Wilson, Jamaica's Education Minister who is due back from the conference today, the agreement would be "mutually beneficial" to developed countries that normally execute the recruitment activities as well as developing countries.
AFFECTED BY AD HOC RECRUITMENTS
Countries such as Barbados, Guyana, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago were particularly affected by incidents of ad hoc recruitments.
It "was being done in a manner that did not allow us to do systematic planning of our education systems," Mrs. Henry-Wilson said.
And Alan Johnson, the British minister for higher education, said in a statement that the protocol "will prevent the exploitation of the scarce human resource of poor countries."
Between 2000 and 2002 South Africa lost 4,000 teachers through overseas recruitment while about 2,000 teachers were recruited from Jamaica.
Last year, Jamaica was among the countries at the Commonwealth Conference which supported a resolution for Britain and the United States to recruit teachers in a more structured way.
