By Leela Ramdeen, Chair, CCSJ (http://rcsocialjusticett.org) & Director, CREDI
From a Catholic perspective, T&T is not promoting authentic integral human development of our children, that is, the development of the young person in all his/her dimensions and of every young person.
As a former Deputy Director of Education/Head of Quality Assurance in a London borough, my observation is that if we are committed to excellence in teaching and learning, then our education system needs to be restructured. Let’s ensure that it is inclusive and catering for diverse learning needs so that our children can realise their potential and function effectively in our knowledge-based society/world. Restructuring must include effective strategies to promote parental/community involvement.
As Trinity Catholic College, Australia, states: “Parental encouragement and support for learning activities at home combined with parental involvement in schooling is critical to children’s education…effective partnerships between parents, families and schools to support children’s learning leads to improved learning outcomes. Parents are the first and continuing educators of their children. Research also shows that teacher quality, including standards and training in parental engagement, is important for facilitating effective parental engagement.”
This year 18,180 pupils wrote the Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) – Creative Writing, Mathematics, and Language Arts. While we congratulate those who have performed well in the SEA, let us not forget that 2,170 pupils scored less than 30 per cent. Of these, 803 under the age of 13 years will be afforded an opportunity to return to primary school for another year and will re-sit the exam next year.
What resources/systems will be in place to raise standards/support teaching and learning processes for these and other pupils? We know that there is not enough staff in Student Support Services, guidance counsellors, social workers, educational psychologists etc. How will this impact on plans to provide “special support” for SEA pupils who scored below 30 per cent – and others who may experience challenges at a secondary level. Will education pass them by? What strategies do we have in place to encourage pupils not to drop out of school?
While I do not wish to outline all the statistics shared by the Minister of Education, Anthony Garcia, it is worth noting, as Dr Lovell Francis, Minister of State in the Ministry of Education stated, “a remarkably high number” of pupils are scoring zero in the SEA exam. Alarm bells should be ringing when we discover that where a cohort of 100 pupils enters secondary school only 20 ultimately graduate.
Dr Francis’ words should spur us to action. He said: “We can’t afford to have 2,000 young people on the cusp of secondary school who are unable to read or write.” He said that the Ministry must focus more attention on these pupils. We wait to see what action will be taken. If, as he said, some pupils are likely challenged by “undiagnosed issues,” what action will be taken to address this and other special needs? Imagine, after seven years in primary school “a remarkably high number” of pupils scored zero!
Pope Paul VI referred to illiterate persons as “starved spirits”. All God’s children are of worth. It is time we put systems in place to raise standards in our educational institutions. Do we have a standards-based system? Data collection and analysis should tell us how our schools are performing. How many of our schools/teachers/parents are adding value to students’ progress?
Minister Garcia stated that the image many have of school supervisors being “glorified messengers” is being addressed and that they, and curriculum advisers, will be visiting schools more regularly. Regular visits must be informed by a comprehensive framework for monitoring and evaluating school/classroom performance.
Is there an agreed framework that they will use – agreed to by key stakeholders – to evaluate school performance/effectiveness? What data do they collect e.g. Do we know which schools have the highest school drop outs and why? How is data analysed, interpreted, stored, used for school self-evaluation?
We need to align external assessment of schools with a framework for continuous internal self-evaluation – like the Ofsted inspection framework in the UK which considers:
- a description of the school (the context in which teaching and learning is taking place)
- Overall effectiveness of the school
- Leadership and management
- Achievement and standards
- Personal development and well-being
- The curriculum (including the hidden/covert curriculum)
- The quality of provision (including resources available/how used)
- Home/school/community links.
Let’s promote quality education for all our pupils.
