Colin Steer, Associate EditorLAST SUNDAY'S publication of the Dennis Minott Report assigning grades and ranking to the island's high schools based on performance in the 2003 Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) exams has evoked much anger and consternation.
The anger expressed by some teachers stems mainly from what they see as the inadequacy of the analysis proffered from the data and consternation among the wider public as they see in black and white, greater evidence of the failure in public policy and practice in educating the majority of children passing through the school system.
Perhaps two main points of consensus have emerged from all the discussions that more must be invested in early childhood education to better prepare students for further studies; and secondly that whatever its flaws, the Minott Report has allowed the society to engage in some soul-searching about what is being done in the majority of our schools, to see where there is a perpetuation of an elitist model of education and the extent to which the most vulnerable children are being neglected.
This report, however, is but the latest evidence of deep problems in the country's education system. Claims can be made of improvements in some areas, but the crisis has been mounting over many years. It seems we had just forgotten.
Recall that 15 or so years ago, the administration at the Mona campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI) was constrained to introduce remedial classes to teach English Language to students who had already completed between five and seven years of secondary education and who had met matriculation requirements for tertiary studies. That problem was well-enunciated by Professor Mervyn Morris from the Department of English in a speech to a graduation class of Calabar High School in the late 1980s and reproduced in The Sunday Gleaner under the headline 'Their grammar are awful!'. The late William 'Bill' Mailer from the Department of Modern Languages, who had spent nearly 30 years at the UWI, commented in an interview for an on-campus publication in 1990 that students were coming to the university less well-prepared for tertiary level studies than in the previous 20 years.
RUDIMENTARY CONCEPTS
The inadequacy of the preparation was not necessarily in the number of subjects 'passed' or even the grades obtained, but in the depth and breadth of knowledge and understanding. The result was that lecturers had to start with rudimentary concepts that should have been mastered in high school. High school principals themselves have had to introduce remedial classes for students who had 'passed' the Common Entrance Examinations but who were clearly not ready for secondary school work.
The society has been lulled into a false sense of complacency for a long time based on the relatively few cases of brilliance in CXC, Cambridge, A Levels, and CAPE exams. The Minott Report is but the latest and perhaps most piercing ring from an alarm bell of the real state of play.
Unfortunately, much focus since last Sunday has been on the performance of traditional high schools St. George's College, Wolmer's Boys, Ardenne, Meadowbrook, Kingston College etc. Many people had settled on the notion that there were 'lesser breeds' among us, whose failure to do well at the secondary level was no big deal. Now that the performance of the 'good' schools is being more closely-scrutinised, there is much distress.
Some educators are already warning that the worst is yet to come. Apparently having introduced the GSAT examinations to ease the societal trauma of bright, competent students being unable to get a place in one of the 'good' high schools, many had settled into a belief that things were getting better.
But while the Government has moved to introduce a common curriculum at the secondary school level, not all schools have either human or financial resources to be as effective as they should.
According to Dr. Polly Bowes-Howell, principal of the Stony Hill Primary and Junior High, although there has been much talk about rationalisation of the education system there continues to be a problem with equity.
"The grade seven child here is not treated the same way as the grade seven child at Oberlin High or the grade seven at Immaculate. Yet it is the same textbook. So what are we talking about? Children here are not renting the books because they are unable to read them," she told The Sunday Gleaner last week.
She, like Ivan 'Wally' Johnson, principal of Kingston College, accepts the usefulness of Dr. Minott's report in putting the data on performance on the table for public discussion. They, however, question both methodology and conclusions.
"What I saw coming out of the report is that we are looking at the knowledge base those students who are bright and can remember. Are we saying that the children in Trench Town did not make any move? What did the teachers there get to begin with? How many of these children who went to Trench Town went there as a first choice? These schools are taking children that nobody else would take," Dr. Bowes-Howell said.
CURRICULUM
She contends that Dr. Minott's study would have been more useful had he done research over a three-year period and showed how each school performed over that period. "It would also have been useful to put them into categories because there are different programmes and different emphases as they relate to the curriculum." Mr. Johnson also suggested that ranking schools on the basis of one year's performance is not particularly useful by itself.
He referred to KC being ranked at C+ while Manchester High got a D. "Did they take into consideration that many of Manchester High's bright students sit several CXC subjects at grade 10 (fourth form) and that some in grade 11 (fifth form) are already doing the CAPE exams?"
Dr. Minott asserted in his report that a key factor in the performance of many schools was the vision and leadership of the principal. Mr. Johnson agreed that enlightened vision and leadership can take a school very far but cautions that, at the same time, one has to examine the cohort of students coming into the school at grade seven. "It is a truism that an enlightened administration will perform better than others. Many schools may have been suffering because they lack this enlightened leadership but there are variables."
He contends that the top performing school in 2003 would probably be Wolmer's Girls based on where they are coming from as against Immaculate or Campion which got the best performing students in the Common Entrance Exams to begin with.
"We're not trying to diminish what is happening at Cam-pion and Immaculate but when you start out with students performing at 99 per cent without many of the social baggage and distractions common elsewhere, and you take them to 100 per cent, the hurdles would have been far fewer," he said.
Dr. Bowes-Howell concurs. "Never before have we had so many principals as well-trained as we now have. They have received training locally and some have gone overseas. There are a few of us who are not able to cope with the challenges of the classroom, but the role of the principal has certainly changed. But many of our children have no homes, no stable base. We have become social workers, guidance counsellors, mentors.
"What do you expect of children who are assigned homework when the noise level that some of them encounter at home is so overwhelming? Children come to me with two and three sets of clothes to change because after school they are heading downtown Kingston to hustle. I took away a dagger from a boy last week. He said it was his protection from the bigger boys downtown who want to take away his money."
She rejects the notion that the poor performance of schools stems from an absence of vision or leadership from principals. "Categor-ically, emphatically no! The role of the principal is not the same as 30 years ago. And while we are saying principals are responsible and accountable, it cannot be left on the whims and fancy of persons outside the system to critique our performance without knowing all that is happening."
Founder of the Mandeville-based Liberal Arts College, W. Val Chambers, contends, however, that Dr. Minott's report was an interesting and legitimate assessment of the schools although it was for one year only.
"It is unfair only in the sense that some schools got 'lesser' students to begin with. But schools must learn to work with what they get."
He said some teachers have been complaining too much about the parental and dysfunctional backgrounds of students. He charged that many of the teachers in the system are neither well-trained for nor enthusiastic about their jobs. "How often do teachers read anything apart from the textbooks related to their subject areas?"
But he charged that the schools that came out on top in the Minott Report don't have much to their credit either. "The fact is they have always creamed off the best performing students over the years. Why is it that six of 10 Government scholarship winners should go to Campion College?"
For Dr. Chambers, the poor performance in the 2003 CXC exams is but one evidence of "the fowls coming home to roost".
"The nation must get teachers up to a higher level. They must be better-trained for the jobs they are doing. It is not by accident that Trinidad out-performs Jamaica in CXC examinations. And even when many of our college-trained teachers go on to university to get degrees they do so in a perfunctory manner," he said.
Hyacinth Evans, professor of Teacher Education and director of the Institute of Education at the University of the West Indies, said efforts were already being made to upgrade the training of teachers already in the classroom as well as that of administrators.
The Ministry of Education, she said, has recognised the deficiencies in many schools given the legacy of under-funding and low expectations.
"For example, the Ministry has embarked on a programme of providing training for principals in leadership and administrative skills how to better manage a school. But it will take some time before the results are seen."
She noted that a Professional Development Unit was established some years ago to upgrade staff training and help new teachers coming into the system to learn how to do a more effective job in the classroom.
"Even though teachers would have received training at college or university, they still need on-going training so that they can be better able to teach."
She pointed to the importance of interaction among teachers in seminars so they may learn about the methods used by others. "When they operate in isolation they tend to fall back on traditional methods which are not always best."
Professor Evans said the challenges faced by educators cut across class barriers even though they are different.
BACKGROUNDS
"While children from poorer backgrounds will present more obvious cases of needs, middle class children also have their challenges and the teachers have to be trained to deal with all of these things even as they concentrate on the main business of teaching," she told The Sunday Gleaner.
Additionally, attempts are also being made to develop professional accountability in all schools.
Meanwhile, according to Dr. Bowes-Howell while the Government has attempted to address four areas of school reform in recent years access, equity, quality and relevance of curriculum, much remains to be done.
"In terms of access, the Ministry gets a 90-plus per cent grade. They have sought to ensure that every child has a place. But the sore points are in the areas of equity and quality. I am saying 'yes' I am going to take these children who are performing at 30 per cent and below but you can't send them to me without adequate resources," she told The Sunday Gleaner.
KC's 'Wally' Johnson is concerned about another aspect of the Minott Report the psychological impact on the society.
"They have gone ahead and ranked schools and once that is in black and white, whether intentional or not, it is difficult to remove the perceptions created by the report. I don't believe we should set up academic competitions among schools in the same way we do sports," he said.
