CASTRIES, St. Lucia (CMC):
A senior Caribbean Community (CARICOM) official has welcomed the move by regional governments to provide universal secondary education, but cautioned that the necessary mechanism must be put in place to ensure that students actually benefit from the educational opportunities.
Deputy Programme Manager for Education at the CARICOM Secretariat, Dr Morella Joseph, this week told regional journalists there were "disturbing trends" in the education system across CARICOM, even as a number of countries move to offer universal access to secondary education.
mechanisms
"It is a good thing, yes. But you have to ensure that the mechanisms, the provisions are put in place so that every child will be able to leave school with some form of certification that is recognisable by employers," Dr Joseph, who taught for over 30 years, said.
The former teacher was speaking during a workshop in St Lucia dubbed "Education for All" organised by the Association of Caribbean Media Workers (ACM) in collaboration with the United Nations Education Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).
She said that on leaving secondary school students should be able to able to read, write, compute and "engage in some form of technology". "You have to bear all this in mind when you are talking education for all," she said.
Dr. Joseph noted that some students had problems transitioning the different physical surroundings and teaching styles in secondary school and this may result in truancy and dropouts.
"If they do not put things in place you will end up having more drop-outs, more cases of truancy and many more students absenting themselves from school. And not only that, you are going to frustrate the teachers as well," she said.
Although not speaking specifically about any particular country, Dr Joseph said too many students who were performing below the national average were being moved from primary to secondary school. "What is being put in place to cater for those who are below the national mean?" she said.
"I was principal of a school for many years and I can tell you there were many up to form four and five, ready to write CXC, and they were barely functionally literate," she added.
She noted that primary school students who were underachieving move to secondary school where they have to "compete with the best".
"We just have to make sure that these kids do not fall through the cracks," Dr Joseph said, noting the significant differences between the style of teaching in primary and secondary schools. "People (teachers) have now adopted the style of standing before the class and it's almost like what obtains at university. You lecture to the kids. It's no wonder you have many of these who could barely comprehend in the midst." Dr Joseph further said the disparity in the quality of Caribbean Examination Council (CXC) is another "disturbing trends" with much attention paid to students who pass more than five subjects.
"What about those who cannot pass a subject at the basic level? What about the 30, 35, 40 per cent who cannot pass one, two, three CXC O'levels? Where are they now? Where are they now? What is in place for these young people?" Dr Joseph asked.
"These are some of the things we have to address if we are to meet our goals," she said. The two-day workshop was aimed at getting journalists more involved in education reporting with particular emphasis on promoting the goals of the Education for All (EFA) initiative.
St. Lucia has identified September 2006 as the target date for the accomplishment of universal access to secondary education, a feat which the government of St. Vincent and the Grenadines achieved last September.
