THE EDITOR, Sir:PERHAPS THE only good thing that can be said about the Minott report is that it has focused the nation's attention on education.
However, the attempt to assess the value of schools, for that is what grading schools does, entirely on the basis of outcomes of the CXC exams is at best superficial and at worst dangerous.
For, if taken seriously, it will merely entrench the worst aspect of our education system, namely, the tradition of exclusion and exclusiveness.
From the earliest days our traditional schools had always depended on entrance exams to select students. Some schools even required that students maintain a certain percentage average in order to keep their places.
I'm not sure that this policy does not still exist in some of the so-called A Grade schools. They achieved excellent results, of course, but it was excellence by exclusion. (Perhaps all that has happened to St. George's is that the cohort of students that they would usually get now go to Campion).
But such a policy ensures an impressive image of success and says nothing about the quality of teaching.
I have yet to hear some concrete suggestion about teaching methods at any of these schools that cause them to produce better results than the rest.
Yet any worthwhile report should identify them if there are any. Teachers at such schools are not really being challenged to the same extent as those who have to deal with slower unmotivated learners.
The system has become status driven with 'brand name schools' being well-packaged. If many of the schools that were given low grades are properly examined it would be found that they regularly produce results from a small number of students that can be compared with the best at any of the A Grade schools.
That, in my opinion, is what a good school is all about. How many of the A Grade schools accept students at a grade nine level, who did not pass GSAT?
Good teachers must be able to produce some success from slow learners.
I am, etc.,
R. HOWARD THOMPSON
Rockton Drive, Waltham
Mandeville
