Fixing SEA – the Hidden Truth revealed

Some 1367 students to enter high school not being able to read, write and count; and 807 will repeat the SEA examination.

Status review taken by the leadership according to the Editorial in the Guardian newspaper of July 7, 2017 disclosed that Dr. Lovell Francis, Minister, Tertiary Education and Skills Training, is of the view that “it ‘s at the bottom where the Ministry should be focussing more on”, while Anthony Garcia, Minister of Education, plans to summon the Student Support Services to the rescue.

The ex-Minister, Dr Gopeesingh announced loudly and clearly of the great successes in education that were driven by the specialist team of psychologists, diagnosticians, special educators, not excluding the social workers and guidance officers who often persevere to fix the damage.

Have we seen any success? It’s now public knowledge that there is indeed an Inclusive Education Policy that was endorsed in 2009 with a structure of personnel that ranged from executive management to support staff.

The existence of an Inclusive Education Policy was disclosed in the Draft National Policy on Persons with Disabilities.

The truth is that “Inclusive education” was introduced before its time, obviously without a mandate, without policy guidelines or policy definition.

The outcome witnessed a group of young energetic persons who will enter high school in September 2017 labelled generally as slow, retarded, ill behaved, illiterate, innumerate — generally lacking motivation.

By 2020, these students will constitute the numbers of high school drop-outs, labelled now as “the bane of society”, the fearless, the aimless, marginalised, without future, without physiological, emotional support.

Several will attract social welfare, others become recipients of ill — gotten gains.

Few will enter their own small businesses or enroll in a skills programmes. There will not be any sustainable jobs for them.

Do we care? Where are the churches, the NGO s, the civil societies which preach everyday about helping the downtrodden and hold out so much promise for the future? The former President of the Chamber of Commerce suggested that Trinidad and Tobago would have to import labour. I wonder if that suggestion still holds? There are hundreds of university graduates who have acquired degrees in education.

Several have acquired master’s degrees, but there are still no jobs for them.

These are the abled bodied individuals who, for want of “betterment” settle for positions in the Ministry of Education that require less than a high school certificate.

When are we going to utilise smartly the resources we have so that we can alleviate our problems with literacy and numeracy? Thankfully, we are now seeking to enact legislation for persons with disabilities following ratification of the United Nations Convention of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (June,2015).

Thus, our disabled population may have equal rights to education, employment, respect and recognition.

Perhaps the scales may fall from the eyes of many, so that they may see the problems clearly and most importantly do something about them.

While legislation carries transparency, accountability, and sanctions, policy requires reviews and feedback, collaboration and consultation.

As an advocate for social integration, the journey uphill is tireless and seemingly without end.

Nevertheless, we must embrace the vision that rises in the horizon of change.