The Editor, Sir:

The Government of Jamaica came on stream with a programme to offer secondary school teachers a chance to get their degrees in their area of discipline over a 10-year period. This initiative is good but the trauma and distress that it has put people through is another issue.

When the programme started, a variety of methods were used to get the lessons across, such as teleconference, face to face and by the Internet. Now it is only being offered over the Internet. You may be lucky if a lecturer calls you in for a face-to-face session during the whole semester.

The lecturer posts work; you get it done and then send it off. If you want something clarified, you rarely get an answer. I don't know if this is happening because it is free; and it is not even free because we are bonded for three years when we are finished. We are treated unfairly except by lecturers we see when we go on campus for six weeks in the summer.

There are people who should have been finished already but when they are in their last semester they are told that they have more courses to do. Something needs to be done about this. It is very hard to study under these conditions.

There are so many flaws in this programme; you can barely see the positives. I am suggesting that the Ministry of Education look into this matter. The name of the programme is B.Ed Distance Secondary Programme.

I am, etc.,

ANN MARIE

annmariethorney@yahoo.com

St Ann

Via Go-Jamaica