The Gleaner's publication, Education 2020.Shut down
Charlie Smith High had to be shut down for three and a half days in April 2007, one month before the start of CSEC examinations, because of gang violence in Arnett Gardens.
"There were extra classes, but not really everybody came," Kelly tells The Sunday Gleaner. "To get them really refocused to start up again was really a major task. So the violence did have a major effect overall," he adds.
Some students, he relates, could not venture out to school for the better part of the last school year. Even at the beginning of this school year, the student population dwindled as some pupils who had relatives intimately involved in the violence stayed away to avoid reprisal attacks.
"We are fortunate that over the last six months, we have had no major incidents. I hope I'm not talking too soon," Kelly cautions.
Lessons affected
In recent times, the Holy Family Primary School in central Kingston lost an entire day of school as warring gangs from Tel-Aviv and Southside clashed.
Classes were out on April 30 and lessons affected for several hours on the previous day as teachers, led by school principal Cecile Palmer, marched to the Jamaica Teachers' Association (JTA) headquarters on Church Street, seeking help.
"It was barely a trickle last week," following Wednesday's closure, Palmer discloses.
School administrators, with assistance from education ministry officials, were occupied on Monday and Tuesday last week counselling the 1,060 students.
"With what our children were going through, we couldn't just come in and write mathematics or language on the board," Palmer explains. The 121 four- to five-year-old children in the school's infant department were the most affected. Only 10 showed up for classes last week.
Trying to push on
But the school is trying to push on in spite of the adversity and is busy preparing students for the upcoming National Primary School Track and Field Championships.
"We just want our community to be nice to our children and create the kind of environment for them to learn," Palmer pleads.
Teaching at the August Town Primary School in eastern St Andrew was severely handicapped by gang violence most of last year. In the wake of the latest incidents, classes were curtailed when only 20 of the 420 students turned up on Wednesday, March 19.
"When the shots are being fired, the students, everybody loses focus. As a matter of fact, even on the day of their GSAT exam, shots were being fired and the kids ran leaving their paper," Morlton Wilson, principal, reveals.
Much of last year was spent counselling the children, but even that has been a task, he says, because the school has only one guidance counsellor.
gareth.manning@gleanerjm.com
