n, Chair, CCSJ and Director, CREDI
CCSJ members add our name to the list of those who are asking Cabinet to revisit its decision to discontinue the Government Assistance for Tuition Expenses (GATE) funding for persons over the age of 50 years.
It is noted that those over 50s already enrolled in undergraduate programmes will still be able to access GATE. Although age is not a ‘status’ under TT’s Equal Opportunity Act (Chap 22:03), the Equal Opportunity Commission (EOC), as stated in its press release on this issue, has submitted proposals to the office of the Attorney General for the act to be amended to include age as a status ground.
CCSJ agrees with CREDI that while the new GATE measures are for the most part reasonable, the decision to discontinue GATE funding for over 50s should be reconsidered. We have to be careful not to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
We will be making a retrograde step if we discriminate against an entire section of our community by denying over-50s access to at least some GATE funding, for example, via means testing and limited to one degree per student at each level. Let’s target funding that, as CREDI stated, should be linked to “programmes supporting national development goals and programmes that address social issues and promote integral human development”. The EOC is correct. There are solutions that will not be discriminatory.
While recognising the need for tight budgets during the current recession/structural adjustment, we should review our priorities. Now, more than ever, we need to ensure that our decisions are people-centred. Pope Francis asks us to reject the “throwaway culture” that threatens to overwhelm us. The lives of over 50s matter; they are of worth. Our population is ageing – 14 per cent over 60s – rising to 20 per cent by 2050.
Albert Einstein said that “Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death.” Education, of course, involves more than intellectual growth. To develop a truly authentic education system, we must ask ourselves questions such as: “What kind of citizen/society do we wish to nurture? What is our vision for education, for authentic integral human development and lifelong learning in TT?”
Let’s address the kind of knowledge, skills, morals, values and attitudes that our people need to develop if we are to become an innovative, creative, knowledge-based society/economy in this technologically-driven world.
The media has been replete with reasons why some individuals seek to further their education after they have attained 50 years. For example, see CREDI’s statement in last week’s Catholic News. As a Director of CREDI, I repeat the words in CREDI’s statement that “persons over the age of 50 comprise a valuable resource, and can still make a significant contribution to national development”. And while we recognise that there are multiple ways of learning/accessing knowledge in this digital age, let us not close doors to over 50s accessing this valuable GATE resource.
We have recently observed Emancipation Day (August 1). On Tuesday, August 23 the world will mark the International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition, and in a few days’ time, on August 31, T&T will celebrate Independence Day. These significant milestones in our history should mean something to us and should influence our decision-making for ALL.
It was Frederick Douglass who said: “To educate a man is to unfit him to be a slave.” As many of you will know, Douglass was an African-American social reformer, abolitionist, writer, and statesman who had escaped from slavery in Maryland, in the US. His speech on July 5, 1852, at an event celebrating the Declaration of US Independence is noteworthy.
Inter alia, he said: “Knowledge was then (during slavery) confined and enjoyed by the privileged few, and the multitude walked on in mental darkness.” Today there are many in T&T/the world who yearn to lift themselves out of mental darkness by accessing education at all levels. Education is essential for personal and national well-being. Let’s seek to open doors, not close them.
Participation is a key social justice principle. The US Bishops state: “How we organise our society – in economics and politics, in law and policy – directly affects human dignity and the capacity of individuals to grow in community.”
Our people will be able to participate more effectively in society if they can develop their God-given gifts/talents at all stages in life. Our goal should be to use our resources wisely – providing opportunities that will enable citizens to lift themselves, and T&T, to a “higher, more noble place” (Martin Luther King Jr) and to function effectively on the global stage.
