Tweet
Redesigning a broken system
Published: Friday | September 2, 2011
I think there is widespread consensus that Jamaica's education system is broken. Most persons would agree, I believe, that the main problems are:
The primary system has failed to produce majority literates by grade six.In particular, the primary system has failed boys who, on average, perform far below the girls at GSAT.
The top primary students in Jamaica are world-class, but in general, the primary system has failed to produce good-quality secondary-standard students.
The disparity in quality between government primary schools and private preparatory schools is too great.
The disparity in quality between traditional high schools and the recently upgraded high schools is too great.
The significantly larger number of places in traditional high schools for girls creates a gender imbalance in favour of girls in the education system.
There is a disparity in traditional high-school places which favours the urban areas, and Kingston in particular.
The performance of secondary students in CSEC exams is generally poor, and of boys, particularly poor.
There are more than twice the number of females at the tertiary level in Jamaica than males.
Top-heavy labour force
The result of this failure of the Jamaican education system has produced a labour force top-heavy in unskilled manual labour, and short on entrepreneurial drive in the productive sector (there is no shortage of entrepreneurs in the higglering and hustling sector). The gender imbalance in education (the demographic imbalance is minimal) has wreaked havoc with the Jamaican family, and has led to the overall marginalisation of the Jamaican male in all but a few spheres of Jamaican life.
There are those (I am among them) who believe that what is now called a failing education system was actually intended (and designed) to function that way: an agriculture-based economy dependent on unskilled manual workers (mostly males) in sugar cane, banana and coffee does not want a mass-focused (especially rural) education system creating labour shortages. As our economy has shifted towards tourism and manufacturing and services, our education system has not adjusted to match, and we are still producing cane cutters and banana weeders in an economy which needs hospitality workers, electronics engineers and software designers.
The solution is to redesign the education system from bottom to top, which will cause dislocation; but then, that is what realignment is all about.
The main problem in the primary system, as I see it, is the high
pupil-teacher ratio. At the primary level, a statistical ratio of 42:1 translates in the classroom to 60:1, or even higher (teachers need non-teaching periods). In private prep schools, there are usually 30 students in a class, with two teachers (one an untrained assistant), which produces an effective ratio of 15:1. Primary and prep schools must be brought closer together. This is an expensive proposition, but who said that human development is cheap!
With smaller classes (or more teachers in each class), students - especially boys - will get more personal attention. Since we know there is a particular problem with boys, put them in front and the girls at the back (the reverse of the current situation, which produces male marginalisation).
Double the number of teachers
Obviously, we are going to need about twice the number of teachers we now have; and they must be properly trained, especially in gender-specific teaching techniques (boys learn different to girls) and in remedial skills (diagnosing the problem, and designing a specific solution).
One problem not often spoken about is that, according to government statistics, about 10 per cent of teachers at the primary level are pre-trained (we must abandon this euphemism and call it what it is: they are untrained teachers). We must set a target that, say, by 2020, there will be no untrained teachers at the primary level.
And teachers trained to tutor at the primary level should not be teaching at the secondary level.
For me, the major problem at the secondary level is the gender disparity, which is exacerbated by co-educational schools. The psychologists tell us that girls develop faster than boys between ages 10 and 17; afterwards, the boys catch up. Put boys and girls in the same class between 10 and 17 and, generally, the girls will outperform the boys, and give them inferiority complexes. This is not rocket science.
Therefore, at the secondary level, all the schools should either be single-sex schools, or have single-sex classes from grades seven to 11. That should be easy enough to implement.
Peter Espeut is a sociologist and a Roman Catholic deacon. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/2...cleisure3.html
Published: Friday | September 2, 2011
I think there is widespread consensus that Jamaica's education system is broken. Most persons would agree, I believe, that the main problems are:
The primary system has failed to produce majority literates by grade six.In particular, the primary system has failed boys who, on average, perform far below the girls at GSAT.
The top primary students in Jamaica are world-class, but in general, the primary system has failed to produce good-quality secondary-standard students.
The disparity in quality between government primary schools and private preparatory schools is too great.
The disparity in quality between traditional high schools and the recently upgraded high schools is too great.
The significantly larger number of places in traditional high schools for girls creates a gender imbalance in favour of girls in the education system.
There is a disparity in traditional high-school places which favours the urban areas, and Kingston in particular.
The performance of secondary students in CSEC exams is generally poor, and of boys, particularly poor.
There are more than twice the number of females at the tertiary level in Jamaica than males.
Top-heavy labour force
The result of this failure of the Jamaican education system has produced a labour force top-heavy in unskilled manual labour, and short on entrepreneurial drive in the productive sector (there is no shortage of entrepreneurs in the higglering and hustling sector). The gender imbalance in education (the demographic imbalance is minimal) has wreaked havoc with the Jamaican family, and has led to the overall marginalisation of the Jamaican male in all but a few spheres of Jamaican life.
There are those (I am among them) who believe that what is now called a failing education system was actually intended (and designed) to function that way: an agriculture-based economy dependent on unskilled manual workers (mostly males) in sugar cane, banana and coffee does not want a mass-focused (especially rural) education system creating labour shortages. As our economy has shifted towards tourism and manufacturing and services, our education system has not adjusted to match, and we are still producing cane cutters and banana weeders in an economy which needs hospitality workers, electronics engineers and software designers.
The solution is to redesign the education system from bottom to top, which will cause dislocation; but then, that is what realignment is all about.
The main problem in the primary system, as I see it, is the high
pupil-teacher ratio. At the primary level, a statistical ratio of 42:1 translates in the classroom to 60:1, or even higher (teachers need non-teaching periods). In private prep schools, there are usually 30 students in a class, with two teachers (one an untrained assistant), which produces an effective ratio of 15:1. Primary and prep schools must be brought closer together. This is an expensive proposition, but who said that human development is cheap!
With smaller classes (or more teachers in each class), students - especially boys - will get more personal attention. Since we know there is a particular problem with boys, put them in front and the girls at the back (the reverse of the current situation, which produces male marginalisation).
Double the number of teachers
Obviously, we are going to need about twice the number of teachers we now have; and they must be properly trained, especially in gender-specific teaching techniques (boys learn different to girls) and in remedial skills (diagnosing the problem, and designing a specific solution).
One problem not often spoken about is that, according to government statistics, about 10 per cent of teachers at the primary level are pre-trained (we must abandon this euphemism and call it what it is: they are untrained teachers). We must set a target that, say, by 2020, there will be no untrained teachers at the primary level.
And teachers trained to tutor at the primary level should not be teaching at the secondary level.
For me, the major problem at the secondary level is the gender disparity, which is exacerbated by co-educational schools. The psychologists tell us that girls develop faster than boys between ages 10 and 17; afterwards, the boys catch up. Put boys and girls in the same class between 10 and 17 and, generally, the girls will outperform the boys, and give them inferiority complexes. This is not rocket science.
Therefore, at the secondary level, all the schools should either be single-sex schools, or have single-sex classes from grades seven to 11. That should be easy enough to implement.
Peter Espeut is a sociologist and a Roman Catholic deacon. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/2...cleisure3.html
), I do not see where she achieved anything during the year of her Presidency.
Something is WRONG with that picture.
Comment