Time to tackle literacy in secondary schools
TACKLING the literacy problem at primary schools is all well and good, but what is happening at the secondary level? This question was asked by first vice president of the Caribbean Union of Teachers (CUT) Roustan Job. He was speaking at Wednesday’s breakfast/panel discussion on reading entitled "Advancing Solutions" hosted by the National Primary Schools Principals’ Association at the Cascadia Hotel, St Ann’s. Job noted that as a teacher of Fourth and Fifth Forms at the Malick Secondary School, he had noticed a number of students whose literacy level was very low. He said there was a high failure rate in this year’s CXC exams. He noted that universal secondary education was introduced five years ago. Minister of Education Hazel Manning has said that of the 50,639 students who wrote the exams this year, 7,670 received full certificates. Job yesterday said he was aware that literacy was a worldwide problem. He claimed figures showed 125 million children worldwide were denied access to basic education, and one adult in three represented an additional 900 million people who were illiterate. He said with no quick-fix solution to the problem, he wondered how many Caribbean countries offered a reading degree at university, or if ministries had a department of reading, and why the UWI requires an English entrance exam. He said the questions needed to be pondered. Dr Ival Melville-Myers, project coordinator of the Teacher Development Unit of the Ministry of Education, who spoke on behalf of Manning, said the unit’s involvement in the Caribbean Centre of Excellence for Teacher Training (CETT) was aimed at improving the reading skills of students from Infants Year Two to Standard Two. She said the programme, which was piloted in 61 schools, speaks of the ministry’s attempts to deal with literacy. However, she said while the ministry had employed a number of initiatives to tackle various problems facing students, there was still tremendous work to be done in English and Math, as the National Tests have shown that of the eight educational districts, only three districts scored above the average. The test is given to students in Standards One and Three in primary schools. Melville-Myers urged principals to help teachers take up the challenge to ensure that students leave school with a "high level of literacy." She said questions about the methodologies used in teaching reading will continue to be raised, and they will go on if solutions are to be found.
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"Time to tackle literacy in secondary schools"