Even as the issue of corporal punishment remains in suspension mode in the National Assembly, the Ministry of Education remains steadfast in embracing the practice in the school system.
Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand, at a recent press conference, said, “The Ministry’s policy on corporal punishment hasn’t changed…it is allowed in school.”

However, she asserted that the use of corporal punishment in the school system is governed by regulated written policies that are in place.
But the Ministry is ready and willing to be guided by the decision of Parliament on the matter, she added.
She said that although the National Assembly, at a Tripartite Level, is looking at Corporal Punishment, generally there is specific attention being paid to the issue as it relates to the school system.

“This therefore means that all of the parliamentary parties are tasked with sitting around the table deciding what is best for Guyana as we go forward,” said Manickchand.
Additionally, she said that comments and views of individual members of the public and/or organisations are encouraged to help chart the way forward.
According to Chief Education Officer (CEO), Olato Sam, the input of teachers is also very important to the process. “Teachers’ opinion, thoughts and ideas have been factored into decisions but specifically in this one they play a key role,” he said.

“The compromise position we struck a number of years ago had to do with the wide array of feelings and opinions on this (Corporal Punishment).”
“I think people need to appreciate that we can’t just look at this on one level but my position has always been that this is a national issue, not just a school issue,” said Sam.
He explained that since such decisions will have implications for how children will be treated in the general society it is imperative that the attitude about corporal punishment takes into consideration, parents’ views and emotions as well.

Sam said that several consultations on the issue have in fact produced varied opinions even as he emphasised the importance of collaboration not only with teachers and parents but the Parliament as well as international partners.
“The Ministry does not exist in isolation so all of these things have to be collectively considered when these decisions are being made,” the CEO outlined.
In the interim though, Minister Manickchand said that head teachers as well as teachers are required to comply with the existing Ministry policy which outlines that children should not be beaten merely to ensure that the environment is conducive for learning.

According to Manickchand, “We have specific cases when corporal punishment could be inflicted, specific instruments that can be used and who should administer those blows.”
The issue of corporal punishment has over the past few years spurred much discussions and emotions which were especially emphasised in 2009 when a Berbice teacher was accused of breaching the Ministry’s rules detailed in a document entitled ‘Maintenance of Order and Discipline in Schools/Alternative Forms of Punishment.’
The document categorically states, inter alia, that only a head-teacher can administer corporal punishment to students, or identify a senior teacher to so administer punishment in his or her presence.
This procedure was however not heeded by the teacher.

According to Shaik Baksh, the then Minister of Education, the move of the teacher was viewed by the Ministry as a fundamental breach, and therefore required disciplinary measures being taken by the Teaching Services Commission.

Source: https://www.kaieteurnewsonline.com/2013/07/09/education-ministry-stands-by-corporal-punishment-policy-manickchand/

EDUCATION Minister, Priya Manickchand has said that while the ministry’s policy on corporal punishment has not changed, the issue is currently in suspension mode since it is still being discussed at the parliamentary level.

She made these remarks while responding to a question from a media representative at a recent press conference in the boardroom of the National Centre for Educational Resource Development (NCERD), Kingston.
Manickchand pointed out that the National Assembly is currently looking at this issue at a tripartite level, in order to decide the best way forward, and they are also inviting members of the public, both individuals and organisations, to come forward with their views.
She said that the Ministry of Education awaits the parliamentary committee’s decision, by which they will be guided.
Meanwhile, she said, the education ministry insists that teachers and head teachers comply with their written policy, which says that while corporal punishment is allowed in schools, it is to be regulated and administered in a disciplined manner.
According to her, this includes refraining from inflicting corporal punishment in order for children to learn, or so that it can be easier for them to be taught and only specific instruments should be used to administer these blows.
Last year the ministry held countrywide consultations on corporal punishment with stakeholders, and these stakeholders had varying views on this issue.

Source: http://guyanachronicle.com/2013/07/08/policy-on-corporal-punishment-in-schools-getting-parliamentary-review-views-invited-from-individuals-and-organizations

The British High Commission on Monday launched Phase 1 of a project to upgrade the communication systems in the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security in support of the ministry’s ‘Stamp it out’ initiative to counter violence against women.

A press release said Phase 1 entails establishing full wireless email communication within the ministry. A subsequent phase will be implemented early next year and it is expected to significantly improve external email access to other departments and ministries, and to regional networks. Broadband Wireless Inc has been selected to undertake the work.

The project is intended to build capacity for Minister, Priya Manickchand, to receive key information more quickly and on a regular basis, and will facilitate the speedy dissemination of her instructions throughout the ministry’s network, and her continuing consultations with the wider community. The project forms part of a wider engagement between the Commission and the ministry on developing initiatives to help confront violence against women. These plans will be announced in early 2008.

British High Commissioner Fraser Wheeler said, “We are delighted to be supporting the “Stamp it out” initiative. Violence against women is abhorrent and unacceptable anywhere.

Source: https://www.stabroeknews.com/2007/news/guyana/12/14/uk-upgrading-ministrys-communications-for-stamp-it-out-drive/

THE Ministry of Education, in collaboration with the Inter-American Institute for Co-operation on Agriculture (IICA) on Thursday inaugurated the sixth annual Secondary Schools’ Hydroponics Competition at Leonora Secondary School, West Coast Demerara.

Assistant Chief Education Officer Doodmattie Singh, who chaired the programme, said 45 schools from Regions 2 (Pomeroon/Supenaam),6 (East Berbice/Corentyne) and 10 (Upper Demerara/Upper Berbice) will be participating this year and the official launch was by First Lady Deolatchmee Ramotar.
Mrs. Ramotar said she believes that this initiative is necessary in creating awareness of agriculture and agricultural economics, noting that it is becoming an important area of study for food securty, not only in Guyana but in other places worldwide.
“Initiatives like this will, thus, provide our young people with hands-on experience. Moreover, competitions like this will expose our farmers to innovative and new agricultural techniques which would allow them to build agricultural practices that are more efficient and effective,” she said.
Her Excellency also noted that hydroponics is not a new method of agriculture but has been around for a long time. Nevertheless, she believes that it has special relevance to Guyana, given this country’s vulnerabilities to flooding and extreme heat.

Alternative

She said hydroponics is an alternative means of cultivation that needs to be utilised more by local farmers and people who tend kitchen gardens since its benefits are great, one such being that the process aids in saving water.
“Despite the abundance of water in Guyana, there is a cost to its distribution and accessibility. We need to avoid wastage and encourage conservation of our water resources. Hydroponics, by ensuring the more efficient usage of water, achieves this goal,” the  First Lady observed.
Mrs. Ramotar observed that, given the practical benefits, any attempt at encouraging hydroponics in agriculture is to be commended and she used the forum to congratulate IICA for its role in promoting the practice and sponsoring the secondary schools’ competition.
She continued:“I want to encourage our schools to take part in this competition because it is not just about agriculture but also about expressing the creativity of our young people. I am confident that this year’s competition will see some very interesting submissions from our schools which can be applied nationally.”
Also present on the occasion was research scientist, Soil & Water Management Department, National Agricultural Research & Extension Institute (NAREI), Mr. David Fredericks.
He pointed out that NAREI has been involved in judging the rivalry and, according to him, the agency views hydroponics not only as a way to provide sustainable agriculture but also to adapt to climate change.

Utilised

In addition to conserving water and preventing floods, fertilisers are also more fully utilised in hydroponics, he informed.
Country Representative of the United Nations (UN) Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Dr. Lystra Fletcher-Paul expressed delight at being involved in promoting hydroponic production in Guyana.
She also expressed gratitude to the First Lady for being the patron of the 2012 competition and remarked that the launching of it is only one component of a bigger project entitled ‘Expansion of hydroponics activities in Guyana’ which FAO is funding in collaboration with IICA.
Fletcher-Paul revealed that the project budget is approximately $2.2M of which FAO is contributing $1.5M. It will be implemented in three phases.
Firstly, there will be training workshops for agricultural science teachers and students, extension officers of the Ministry of Agriculture and members of the Blue Flame Women’s Group.
The second phase is the establishment of five hydroponic units and the final phase will be transplanting the seedlings of selected crops into the growing medium, under the supervision of IICA.
The start of the competition is a part of phase two of the project and the five hydroponic units which FAO will be financing, will be established in two practical institutions in Georgetown, one on the East Coast of Demerara, one at St. Ignatius School in Lethem, Rupununi and another on the premises of the Blue Flame Women’s Agro-processing Group in Mabaruma, North West District.

Hopeful

Fletcher-Paul said they are hopeful that, at the end of this project, there would be an increase in the number of teachers, students, extension officers and agro-processors trained in hydroponic technology. It is also hoped that there will be more students completing their practical requirements in hydroponics for the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) syllabus.
She said that the FAO is also proud to be contributing to the achievement of two of Guyana’s objectives for its Poverty Reduction Strategy, which are to facilitate sustainable and stable production systems among vulnerable groups to increase availability of and accessibility to food and to promote systems of use and consumption of healthy foods for increased nutrition in Guyana, especially among vulnerable groups.
“It is a powerful tool from which you can learn some very important lessons. Firstly, it exposes you to new climate smart technology which would provide you and your school with healthy food to add to your diet. Secondly, it’s a viable means of income generation which does not require back-breaking work which you usually associate with farming and agriculture. Thirdly, it allows you to see the practical application of the theory which you will learn in text books and will, therefore, reinforce the knowledge that you will receive from your teachers,” she lectured the audience.

Representing the IICA in Guyana was Sustainable Rural Development Specialist, Mr. Arnold De Mendonca, who said, through the Hydroponics Competition, the Agriculture Ministry in Guyana has adopted hydroponics technology as an integral component of the Agricultural and Environmental Science syllabi and it also forms a part of the School Based Assessment for CSEC.
He commended the Ministry of Education for partnering with IICA to launch the competition, stating:“This technology offers a pivotal link to agricultural diversification, disaster mitigation and food security,”
This year’s competition will be divided into two phases – training for teachers and students and the actual preparation and planting of the various schools’ hydroponic gardens. The schools will be evaluated by a team of agriculturists over a six-week period.

Source: https://guyanachronicle.com/2012/09/08/at-schools-competition-launch-iica-fao-announce-financial-aid-for-hydroponics-promotion

PRESIDENT Donald Ramotar said yesterday that if Guyana is going to accelerate social and economic development and put an end to poverty, education has a key role to play in the struggle.

He was speaking at a rally, aimed at promoting partnership for education delivery, in Queen’s College (QC) Auditorium on Thomas Road, Georgetown.
The Head of State said if more attention is given to the allotted money in the budget, it can be seen that a large portion of the expenses goes to the social sector, of which education is a major part.
He declared that there is no better investment than that in education, as by investing in education an investment is being made in the future of Guyana.

Mr. Ramotar said the most important factor for development is people and added: “We have to increase the capacity of our people and the only way I know that can be done is by improving the educational standards within our country.”
He said equality in education can only be achieved if conditions are created in which educational opportunities provided are fully utilized, and noted the emphasis government is placing on the building of schools and dormitories in the interior locations.

President Ramotar said looking at the results of any examination, there is a broader spread with regard to, from which schools the top performers come. He remembered that, several years ago, one could have counted on one hand from where the outstanding ones came and compared that to the fact that the top successful candidate at this year’s Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) examination was from Essequibo.
He observed that science and technology has been playing a prominent role in societal development and said constant focus needs to be placed on improving the quality of education, teaching students to think critically and ensuring that they become multi-disciplined, in order for them to compete with the rest of the world.

Mr. Ramotar acknowledged that the private sector plays an important part in developing national educational standards and should be encouraged to give scholarships to students to attend various higher institutions locally and even to go abroad.
President Ramotar disclosed that United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon has formed a body to look at global education, and he has been invited to sit on the steering committee, the first meeting of which he will be attending on September 26.

Source: https://guyanachronicle.com/2012/09/08/at-rally-on-partnership-president-ramotar-emphasises-education-key-role-in-ending-poverty

EDUCATION Minister Priya Manickchand has warned that her ministry will be taking a strong stance against inadequacies of contractors and other persons who are hired to do work and fail to deliver.
She said the Ministry will be moving, from now, to apply liquidated damages for every single day that a contract is delayed.

Ms. Manickchand said, when contractors bid and promise to deliver a certain quality of work within a certain time, they must stick to those commitments.
Failure to do so will see them being marched to the Courts where the Ministry of Education would be applying for all the penalties that the contract would allow to be applied against errant contractors, she indicated.
The Minister said it is hoped that the Ministry will be sending a strong message to all other contractors when it makes the first errant one an example.
Manickchand declared that it is almost criminal for a small developing country like Guyana to be paying so much of monies to build educational infrastructures and end up with finished products that cannot be considered value for money.

She said when contractors bid for projects and promise that they can complete jobs within a specific timeframe, for a specific sum of money and fail in that bid, it becomes a burden to the persons who are expected to benefit from the finished projects.
Her comments were made while visiting Diamond Primary School, East Bank Demerra, on Monday where it was discovered that an entire section of the building was not outfitted with windows, despite the period under which the construction was in progress.

She said she was informed that the contractor claimed his inability to install the windows was because the shipment was on a boat that did not arrive in Guyana on schedule.
The Minister said, from now, for every major project that the Ministry awards to a contractor, the details and bills of quantity along with other specifics of the projects will be posted up at strategic locations in the communities where they are being executed.
It is believed that such a move will see the community being able to monitor the projects and, where necessary or wherever they feel that the government and, by extension, the taxpayers are being shortchanged, they will inform the Ministry.

Source: http://guyanachronicle.com/2012/09/05/manickchand-warns-contractors-of-penalties-for-failures

EDUCATION Minister, Priya Manickchand, yesterday paid a visit to the Diamond Primary School, East Bank Demerara, which opened its doors for the first time yesterday and will be accommodating one thousand students.

The minister said she was extremely pleased with the first day’s turnout at the school. She referred to the widely believed myth, and in some cases reality, which says the first day at school is usually the day that nothing really happens.

During yesterday’s visit, the minister received a resounding response from the students with whom she interacted as she walked into their classrooms.

After her visit, she expressed pleasure that despite her visit being a surprise one, all the classes were already into the academic programme and work was already on the chalk boards, with teachers in front of each of the classes.
The minister said similar visits were being made at schools all across the country by the various education officers in their respective districts.

Minister Manickchand said the Diamond Primary School will be given a playfield and other amenities for the convenience of children in attendance. She acknowledged that the school was still under construction, but noted that that phase would eventually pass and the finished building would be comfortable for the nation’s children attending the institution to acquire their primary education.
The minister expressed disappointment at the state of the unfinished north-eastern wing of the school, which has not yet been outfitted with windows.

She said the contractor had informed the Education Ministry that a boat bringing the windows had been delayed and was unable to make the delivery on schedule. That circumstance,
she said, has set back the operations at the school; and when things like this happen, they affect mostly the children.
She said there will have to be tougher sanctions for the contractors, and the Education Ministry is already in the process of finding a new approach to doing business with contractors hired by the Ministry of Education.
Deputy Head Teacher, Wendy Chichester, who is currently acting as head teacher in absence of her superior who is away on leave, spoke with the media yesterday in the presence of the Minister of Education. She said how pleased she was that the school would go down in history as the first to be opened by its deputy head teacher; and added that the teachers, including herself, are happy to be in a position to ensure the children are able to achieve their potential with a quality education.

She promised that teachers would strive together to make the school one of the most child-friendly schools on the East Bank of Demerara, and by extension the country. Ms. Chichester said that, up to assembly time yesterday, the school had about four hundred children who turned out for classes. She said that others have been identified to attend the school, but have to await their transfer papers from the various schools they had attended.
Apart from classrooms, the school has a library, a kitchen, and a rest room; and the deputy head invited the business community and other kind-hearted persons to make donations to the school’s library.
Following that visit to the Diamond Primary School, the minister made a stop at the Diamond Secondary School, where she interacted with the staff, and also those students, who were attending the school for the first time.

The minister encouraged students to make the best of their learning opportunity, cautioning them about the importance of taking their education seriously.
She noted that the Diamond Secondary School was built to achieve universal secondary education, and was developed to accommodate the students who did not gain passes at the then common entrance examinations, now known as the National Grade Six Assessment.

Prior to the Diamond Secondary School being built, students were accommodated in primary schools that had upper levels.
Head teacher of the school said that enrollment and first day experience was not a hassle, since the school facilitated an orientation session in which students had a chance to familiarise themselves with the environment.
She said that following the morning assembly, the students went directly to the classrooms ready to do the academic programme.

The Education Ministry last week announced that several schools were not going to reopen yesterday for classes, as critical works were not fully completed there. Those schools will be reopened next week Monday, September 10.

Source: https://guyanachronicle.com/2012/09/04/minister-manickchand-makes-surprise-visits-on-first-day-of-school

Today, the nation’s children return to school. But from reports in the press, it appears that a significant number will have to stay out for another week or two.

While most of these children would probably not mind an extension of their vacation, apart from the One Mile Primary School in Wismar, there is no excuse for this curtailment of the “Christmas Term”. Will the Ministry of Education (MoE) make provisions to make up for the time lost in teaching the curricula?
Traditionally, September has been designated “Education Month” by the MoE and by today a series of activities, under a named theme, would have been announced. We hope that the delay has been occasioned by a decision of the Minister to have her department tackle the abysmal results of the last CSEC exams ‘frontally”. They might have to recalibrate their interventions.

While not as bad as Guyana’s, the results in the region as a whole were shocking enough to precipitate calls for reform in most territories. CXC has also promised to collaborate with the various governments on remedial diagnostics of their pedagogical principles.
One suggestion that they have already made is that we must move on from the ‘chalk and talk’ methodology that has been in place since the abolition of slavery. The Information Technology tools are now ubiquitous in our society and the Ministry has to use them more effectively for imparting the curricula to its charges.

It is rather ironic that over the past decade there have been numerous outside interventions to introduce computers, for instance, into our school system, starting from the primary level. But in almost all instances, the donated equipment were utilized more in the breach than not.
The government itself recognised the need for schools to be plugged into the ICT world and brought in a new US$30 fibre-optic cable from Brazil, which, among other functions such as e-government, would have accomplished this goal. Since the last elections, however, there has been a studied silence on the status of the fibre-optic cable and the benefits the country should have received.

As we begin this “Education Month”, we hope that the Ministry has taken note of the caution sounded by the Registrar and CEO of CXC on the Pilot School program that was introduced last December to improve our flagging results in CSEC.
This program was basically an intensification of the ‘teach to the test’ methodology that comes straight of the drilling and rote learning route we were handed almost two hundred years ago. Students, given past exam papers, books and a calculator for Mathematics and English by the Ministry were drilled an extra two hours daily by teachers.
The question is whether these students actually came away from these drills with any substantive knowledge of the subjects that would make them move on to perform effectively at the tertiary level or in a working environment. We doubt it. We have to be careful of ‘quick fixes”. There is great wisdom in the folk saying, “rain can’t full wha dew na full”. Any remedial intervention must be conceptualised and executed in a holistic manner.

We have to use the new technology from the nursery level to present that materials in our curricula in a manner that would make the children want to learn.
The electronic media is ideally suited for bringing to life abstract subjects such as mathematics.  A couple of years ago there was a buzz about a low-cost science kit sponsored by UNESCO       that was ideal for bringing home the concepts of the basic sciences. This initiative seems to have died on the vine.
But behind it all, teachers will have to be trained in the new methodology and the school administration will have to get behind the program.

The assessment tests that are now being given from Grade 2 must be modified to incorporate the new technology both in the substantive and procedural aspects.
Most importantly, the results of the assessments must be utilised for the purpose intended: to have the teacher intervene more directly in remedial action.

Source: https://www.kaieteurnewsonline.com/2012/09/03/education-month-2/

BETTERING education delivery has been one of the focal areas of the PPP/C Government, in recognition of the fact that an educated populace is key to the development of a nation. 

Its investments to date have realised tremendous benefits, as the country’s performance at the primary and secondary levels has grown over the years.
But this has not always been the case, as successes were only evident in city schools mostly, and which, each year took the cream of the results. Recognising this, greater attention has been paid to equality among all schools.
This realisation has, in recent times, allowed schools outside of Georgetown to have better access to quality education through the delivery of teaching aids, text books, and teacher training to effectively administer the school’s curriculum.

The construction of modern institutions and the development of the Education Strategic Plan (2008/2013), which was crafted to identify priority policies and strategies, have been aspects pursued.
Since the initiation of the latter, the quality of output has significantly improved – as the increased provision in placement at the nursery level especially in remote regions, improvements in pre-literacy skills, and greater performance at CAPE and CXC, were evident in learning institutions throughout the 10 administrative regions.

Schools throughout the length and breadth of Guyana are now producing top performers, even as the ministry continues to strengthen its partnership with stakeholders, particularly parent/teacher associations and other community social groups.

Last year, the top CSEC performers each gained 15 Grade Ones.  These came from Anurada Dev of Queen’s College, Georgetown, and Shalita Appadu of New Amsterdam Multilateral, Region Six.
This success was also observed in the Mining Town of Linden, with Zainab Abdul Karim  of Mackenzie High and  Seriena Alli of Abrams Zuil Secondary, each achieved 13 Grade Ones.
Students of Anna Regina, Abrams Zuil, and  Cotton Field Secondary, Region 2;  West Demerara, Patentia, Zeeburg and Essequibo Islands secondary schools, Region 3; Bush Lot, Rosignol and Bygeval Secondary Schools, Region 5;  Tagore Memorial, Skeldon Line Path and J C Chandisingh, Region 6;  and St. Ignatius Secondary, Region 9 were also among top scorers at the 2011 exams.

Ninety-seven of the 188 students who  secured Grade One passes in eight or  more subjects  are from Region 4, followed by Region  6, with 32;  Region 2, with 23; and Region 3, with 20.
This year, Sarah Hack of Abrams Zuil copped 16 Grade Ones and there were also several other regional top performers:  Bibi Ameena Nazaralie of Saraswati Vidya Nikitan, and Keikel Mahabir of West Demerara Secondary, with 13 Grade Ones each; Roschelle Sparman of Mackenzie High, and Vishwati Oudhram of Saraswati Vidya Nikitan, with 12 Grade Ones each.
At the National Grade Six Assessment in 2011, Terron Alleyne of Regma Primary, Region 10 copped the top spot. C.V. Nunes in Region 2; Leonora, Region Three; Novar, Region 5; and Cumberland, Region 6 were among the top performers.

Sixteen-year-old Sarah Hack, from Abrams Zuil Secondary School on the Essequibo Coast, Region 2, who copped 16 Grades Ones, accredits her  success to God and the support of family, friends and teachers.
“My faith and trust in God was very enduring. My success was a really taxing journey overall, with many sleepless nights while studying, but it was well worth it,” she said.
Asked about the work of the school, she pointed out that everyone, including teachers, were disciplined, hard workers, even pushy at times, but it was all for the best.
Over the last three years, Abrams Zuil Secondary has been gaining significant attention for its performances, despite being a little school located on the Essequibo coast.  In 2011, the school also secured the first and second top spots for the Region in the CSEC examinations.
The top performer, who will be heading off to College in the United States, come 2013, lauded the teachers in the school system, pointing out that the quality of teaching has improved exponentially.
The school was named after the village.

Spending
Education spending, as a percentage of the National Budget, has risen from 4.4 percent in 1990, to an average of 15 percent over the last seven years. The $24.3B allocation in 2011 was spent on construction and rehabilitation of schools, equipping ICT labs and acquiring of text books. The 2012 allocation is $26.6B.
More than $85.6M was approved by government for the procurement of CXC text books, self-study guides for CXC, revision DVDs, model solutions to difficult answers, geometry sets, graph papers and calculators, which were distributed as part of a pilot project  implemented in underperforming schools.
This year’s results showed that this project did bring about improvements in the CSEC results.

Source: (GINA) ; http://guyanachronicle.com/2012/08/24/with-improvements-in-education-system-regions-now-claiming-top-performers

The reconstruction of the One Mile Primary School at Linden is likely to take more than a year, Education Minister Priya Manickchand announced yesterday, while assuring that none of the students displaced by the situation would be disadvantaged.

Manickchand was at the time addressing parents, teachers and concerned residents of Linden who crammed into the auditorium of the Wismar Hill Primary School, during a visit by the minister and senior officers of the Education Ministry and the region for an update on the school.

Although Manickchand emphasised that the current priority is accommodating the 830 students displaced as a result of the torching of the school building, her news did not sit well with parents and others who were adamant about the need to rebuild. On Sunday, hundreds of residents started clearing away the rubble and began stockpiling sand at the site for the reconstruction of the school.

There is no budget yet for the reconstruction and not much thought has gone into it, Manickchand said, adding that ensuring that all the One Mile Primary students are placed has been the focus.

“I don’t mean to be disrespectful or to sound rude but I haven’t heard any mention of when this government intends to start to work on rebuilding this school, we need to know that now,” said a female parent.

In response, Manickchand said that the government is committed to building schools around the country and Linden is no exception, while adding that she had communicated the government’s commitment to the rebuilding process to the Regional Chairman Sharma Solomon. She, however, added that considering that it was just one week ago that the school was destroyed, the budget for placement of the students in a classroom by the September 3rd, 2012 start of the new academic year has taken priority above the reconstruction. She added that with the decision to accommodate the grades one and two-level students at the One Mile Nursery building, there are costs for putting a number of things in place, including construction of a water trestle, among other things.

“I can tell you that from the Ministry of Education, we are absolutely determined that, as far as we can make it happen because we have limitations with resources and so on, those children who are going to the One Mile Primary School will not be disadvantaged in any way,” she assured.
“Hear nah Minister, Hear nah we building back we school,” shouted a parent in response.

Central role

He added that a quantity surveyor and a structural engineer have been contacted and are expected to do the assessments with regards to establishing the condition of the foundation and the beams of the structure. “So, like I say, it’s gonna be a very involved process, where the community and the government will play their role in the rebuilding,” he said.Later, Solomon said that with the placement of the students covered, the rebuilding of the school would be priority, with the community playing a very central role. Asked to be specific about the community’s involvement, including whether it will be responsible for the construction of the physical structure or any other aspect of the rebuilding process, Solomon re-emphasised that the community’s role will be one of maximum involvement.

By last week Sunday afternoon, the regional education officials had put together a draft plan for students to be accommodated during the new academic year and for the period that the school building would be under construction. The plan, which was proposed to parents, included the enrollment of the new Grade One intake for the 2012 to 2013 academic year.

Manickchand and  Pastor Selwyn Sills, Chairman of the Regional Parent-Teachers Association (RPTA) said that by yesterday afternoon, they were expecting a word from the pastor and board of the nearby Faith Assembly of God Church on use of the church building, thereby eliminating the need for a double shift system. Efforts to contact Sills yesterday afternoon to determine the response of the Church proved futile.But the proposal for the 150 Grade One and Grade Two-level students to be placed at the One Mile Nursery School’s new extension, which was constructed because of the growth in the nursery-level student population, using a double-shift system did not go down very well with parents and even some teachers. Under the proposed shift system, Grade One students would attend the first shift, from 7:30hrs to 11:30hrs and the Grade Two students would attend from 12:00hrs to 16:00hrs.
Given the opportunity to share their views, few residents came forward, but many voiced their concern loudly. Persons who took to the microphone said they were concerned that the nursery school was not adequate while others were not too keen on the shift system. “Remember, we are not at home,” Wismar Hill Primary’s head teacher Joy Webb, however, reminded.

Loud applause

It was also suggested that the St. Aidan’s  Primary School, which has sufficient space, be used to accommodate some students. This proposal did not get much support from parents, who were concerned about the location of the school and the distance their children would have to trek daily to get there. St. Aidan’s Primary is located at Blue Berry Hill, an area where there is no public transportation except for taxis.

Unlike the other levels, the proposal for the placement of the Grade Six students, who would be accommodated at the Block 22 Multi-Purpose Hall, was unanimously accepted. “The members of the Block 22 Community have willingly offered to make the Block 22 Multi-Purpose Hall available. This initiative is welcome, since a large group of pupils for that grade reside in Block 22 and its immediate environs,” Manickchand said.

The minister also informed residents that much work is being put into furnishings and work materials, including lessons plans and scheme of works for teachers, are in place for the new school year.

Following the meeting, Manickchand and her team went on a visit of the site of the torched school building and found that a number of residents were out again yesterday continuing the clearing exercise. She had a separate meeting with the teachers of the One Mile School also, while Sills had called for a meeting of the school’s PTA executives.

Source: https://www.stabroeknews.com/2012/news/guyana/08/21/rebuilding-of-linden-school-likely-to-go-over-a-year-manickchand/