Weed out bad teachers

THE EDITOR: Congratul-ations to our Under 19 West Indies Cricket Team for their performance in the World Cup tournament. They definitely had the appropriate coaching, guidance and role models to be successful cricketers, so I say “hats off” to the coach as well. But how does someone become a cricket coach? Surely you must have some expertise in the area and if nothing at all you have to be an exemplar to your team. Well apparently, there’s a vacancy for a cricket coach in a deep south secondary school.

A subject teacher is presently acting in that position but possesses none of the above qualities. In one particular incident the acting coach was using obscene language during a cricket match in the vicinity of the school. A respectable and retired school teacher spoke to him about his behaviour and the coach then turned his obscenity towards the gentleman. His students then assisted him.

In another incident, he physically assaulted a teacher at a gas station, in view of the young students who looked on in astonishment at the behaviour of this so-called teacher. Would their parents feel comfortable sending their young ones to a secondary school which has a facilitator as this one who does not even attend classes? At present the Minister of Education is doing everything possible to curb the violence in the nation’s school, so that our children will have more love and respect for one another (congratulations).

But when there are delinquent teachers like this one who has done nothing and has no respect for society, I ask myself, “Where has the teaching profession gone to?” As a concerned community member, I am appealing to someone in authority to investigate this teacher thoroughly and get him out of the system. The school has recently taken a positive turn, under new administration and community members and parents would like the institution to be highlighted academically and otherwise as before. Certainly without “teachers” as this acting coach, the school would be a shining light of the community.

ROMA P SINANAN
Cedros