‘No quick fix for national crisis at schools’

Acknowledging that “we are in a national crisis” with regard to what is happening in the education sector today, head of the School Intervention Strategies (SIS) Unit Dr Michael Alleyne yesterday sought to reassure persons that the Ministry of Education’s programmes have already started to help reduce the  violence and acts of indiscipline occurring within the school system. Speaking at this weekly Rotary luncheon at the Queen’s Park Oval, Alleyne said there was no quick-fix solution to the problem, which had not occurred overnight.

Instead, he attributed the developments in schools throughout the country to  globalisation and a reflection of what was happening in wider society. Expressing concern about the recent trend of “revenge killings,” Alleyne said the easy availability of guns to children was indeed alarming. He revealed that the Ministry of Education was currently in discussion with the Ministry of National Security to ensure that there was an additional police presence in and around some high risk schools. Other programmes aimed at helping teachers to deal with anger management are still ongoing, said Alleyne, adding “we have never stopped as we knew this would take a long time.” Stating that the underlying factors for behavioural differences in persons needed to be identified before they could be dealt with, Alleyne said some of the more popular offences committed in schools included taxing, bullying, obscene language, weapons possession, gang fights, sexual misconduct and attacks on teachers.

Elaborating on a report by Prof Ramesh Deosaran, Alleyne said factors identified included economic and social conditions, poor parenting, size of family, low level of spirituality and environmental influences. Admitting that there “are some serious deficiencies in the education system,” he said contributing factors included teacher absenteeism, the curriculum and physical infrastructure. Pleading with everyone that they needed to “mobilise all our resources to try to deal with the problem,” Alleyne warned that “we will not be able to turn the violence around in one day, but we need to stick with it.”