BY GARFIELD MYERS Edititor-at-Large, South/Central Bureau myersg@jamaicaobserver.com
MANDEVILLE, Manchester — Chairman of the National Council on Education, Dr Simon Clarke, is to oversee consultations with “stakeholder groups” and the public regarding the proposed review of the education regulations of 1980, Education Minister Ronnie Thwaites has announced.Clarke, a retired educator, is a former UNESCO Caribbean director and education advisor for the region.Describing the review as the “core of many of the intended improvements in the education system”, Thwaites told a Manchester Chamber of Commerce forum last Thursday that the consultations will “begin this month and we hope to complete them by early next year”.Thwaites said the timetable was to have the amended regulations approved by Parliament during the legislative year.According to Thwaites, the regulations that require review “have to do with the governance of schools, responsibilities and procedures of school boards. It also has to do with rewarding and disciplining of students.Thwaites that social dynamics had rendered the disciplinining of students in schools more complex than had been the case in the past and there was need to provide guidance for teachers.“The fact is that the social fabric in many parts of Jamaica in many schools is not what it was in many parts of Jamaica a generation or two ago and many teachers and school principals are completely at a disadvantage now because what they can do in relation to student behaviour and student conduct is completely inadequate given the social inadequacies of many students,” the minister said.In apparent reference to the Ministry of Education’s ban on corporal punishment, the minister said: “We will not go back to the brutality of a previous era but we must find creative and constructive ways in order to insist that our students recognise that school is not any romping shop; that teachers cannot spend 15 minutes of the class creating order before you can begin to teach the lesson and that this is a pearl of too great price for us to waste on deviant behaviour.”Regarding revision of regulations affecting school boards, Thwaites told the Observer that the “regulations and procedures that govern them are in my view unhelpfully complicated and it is that aspect that will have to be revised.”The minister said he expects that amended regulations will make it easier for school boards and principals “to do their jobs and place more authority in their hands.”The revised regulations would also require greater accountability from educators, he told the Chamber of Commerce.“Our teachers for whom we have the greatest respect need to be accountable in new ways for their conduct and performance,” he said. “This is not to be seen as onerous but there is no job in the world where strong standards of accountability are absent, and therefore the regulations need to be looked at with a new vigour,” said Thwaites.Thwaites said that a companion measure to revising the education regulations “will be the eneactment of the Jamaica Teaching Council Bill which will over see the professionalisation of teachers and their functioning”.He told Manchester business leaders that the “piece of legislation” had been inherited in draft form from the previous Jamaica Labour Party Administration and will be carried to completion after one year and more of consultations with teachers’ representatives, parents and churches who were the “sponsoring agencies of many schools”.CLARKE… served as director of UNESCO Caribbean and education advisor for the regionView the original article here
Simon Clarke to lead education consultations
