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Private sector deaf to Mico sponsorship plea
Only Jamaica National on board for critical Math & Science teacher confab
BY DENISE DENNIS Observer staff reporter dennisd@jamaicaobserver.com
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
CORPORATE Jamaica appears to have shunned sponsorship of a groundbreaking Science and Mathematics teacher education conference to be hosted by The Mico University College on March 19 and 20.
Adjunct Professor at the university, Arnaldo Ventura, lamented at the Observer Monday Exchange yesterday that with the exception of Jamaica National Building Society, no other private sector company has come on board to help sponsor the event.
The conference, themed 'Confronting the Teaching and Learning of Science and Mathematics in the Caribbean and Latin America', is budgeted to cost $3 million to mount, but only between 35 and 40 per cent of that cost has so far been realised.
"We have approached many of the top corporate bodies in Jamaica with very little response. They don't see this conference as being very important at all," Ventura said.
He noted that it was remarkable that the foreign entities that were approached to be a part of the conference came on board without hesitation, recognising its importance.
Practitioners and researchers from Britain, the United States, India, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Finland and other countries are slated to participate in the conference which will see the sharing and discussion of best practices in the two subjects which drive global development.
"They see this conference as pivotal to what happens across the world, and in Jamaica, we pay scant attention to it," he said. "And because of that, we are now struggling to get the conference to work as it ought to."
Ventura said the lack of support for the conference by the corporate world is reflective of the general lack of investment in science and technology.
"It must start now, it can't start tomorrow, and the conference is just one example of the fact that we put very little investment in what will determine our future. That might seem grandiose, but it's a fact," said Professor Ventura.
Director of Alumni Affairs at The Mico, Sharon Wolfe, said the university is still engaging potential corporate partners in the hope that they will come on board, but also shared her disappointment.
"Some of our corporate friends, they talk excellent talk, but when it comes to putting something down, their response is not what we would like," Wolfe said. "The talk is there, but we have found that the ability to walk that talk is very weak."
However, she said Mico is confident that the conference, which should accommodate between 300 and 500 participants, will nonetheless go on.
"We have decided, and we know for a fact that what it is that we are aiming to do is critical to our development," she declared.
This conference is part of the teacher-training institution's efforts to focus attention on severe shortcomings in the teaching and learning of Science and Mathematics in Jamaica.
Dr Tamika Benjamin, director of the Caribbean Centre of Excellence in Mathematics Teaching (CCEMat) explained that students continue to underperform in both subjects, which form the underpinnings of all growth and development of the country.
"While we are saying Math and Science, we are saying they are linked together; the teaching of them is linked. We tend to see them separately and we have not really been able to, in our system, integrate them more creatively and effectively in terms of delivering a curriculum," she said.
Benjamin said the hope is that the conference will bring more attention to the issues that are impacting the low levels of performance of students, and at the same time begin to look at solutions to the problems.
Early childhood, primary, secondary and tertiary education will be addressed at the two-day conference which will cater to a wide range of educators — teacher-educators, principals of teacher education institutions and primary, secondary and early childhood teachers.
A key component of the conference will be what the university is calling the Jamaica Declaration, which will propose solutions for handling the challenges to improve performance in Mathematics and Science and inform teacher preparation and curriculum development in these crtitical subjects.
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...#ixzz1n14Xr2pY
Only Jamaica National on board for critical Math & Science teacher confab
BY DENISE DENNIS Observer staff reporter dennisd@jamaicaobserver.com
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
CORPORATE Jamaica appears to have shunned sponsorship of a groundbreaking Science and Mathematics teacher education conference to be hosted by The Mico University College on March 19 and 20.
Adjunct Professor at the university, Arnaldo Ventura, lamented at the Observer Monday Exchange yesterday that with the exception of Jamaica National Building Society, no other private sector company has come on board to help sponsor the event.
The conference, themed 'Confronting the Teaching and Learning of Science and Mathematics in the Caribbean and Latin America', is budgeted to cost $3 million to mount, but only between 35 and 40 per cent of that cost has so far been realised.
"We have approached many of the top corporate bodies in Jamaica with very little response. They don't see this conference as being very important at all," Ventura said.
He noted that it was remarkable that the foreign entities that were approached to be a part of the conference came on board without hesitation, recognising its importance.
Practitioners and researchers from Britain, the United States, India, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Finland and other countries are slated to participate in the conference which will see the sharing and discussion of best practices in the two subjects which drive global development.
"They see this conference as pivotal to what happens across the world, and in Jamaica, we pay scant attention to it," he said. "And because of that, we are now struggling to get the conference to work as it ought to."
Ventura said the lack of support for the conference by the corporate world is reflective of the general lack of investment in science and technology.
"It must start now, it can't start tomorrow, and the conference is just one example of the fact that we put very little investment in what will determine our future. That might seem grandiose, but it's a fact," said Professor Ventura.
Director of Alumni Affairs at The Mico, Sharon Wolfe, said the university is still engaging potential corporate partners in the hope that they will come on board, but also shared her disappointment.
"Some of our corporate friends, they talk excellent talk, but when it comes to putting something down, their response is not what we would like," Wolfe said. "The talk is there, but we have found that the ability to walk that talk is very weak."
However, she said Mico is confident that the conference, which should accommodate between 300 and 500 participants, will nonetheless go on.
"We have decided, and we know for a fact that what it is that we are aiming to do is critical to our development," she declared.
This conference is part of the teacher-training institution's efforts to focus attention on severe shortcomings in the teaching and learning of Science and Mathematics in Jamaica.
Dr Tamika Benjamin, director of the Caribbean Centre of Excellence in Mathematics Teaching (CCEMat) explained that students continue to underperform in both subjects, which form the underpinnings of all growth and development of the country.
"While we are saying Math and Science, we are saying they are linked together; the teaching of them is linked. We tend to see them separately and we have not really been able to, in our system, integrate them more creatively and effectively in terms of delivering a curriculum," she said.
Benjamin said the hope is that the conference will bring more attention to the issues that are impacting the low levels of performance of students, and at the same time begin to look at solutions to the problems.
Early childhood, primary, secondary and tertiary education will be addressed at the two-day conference which will cater to a wide range of educators — teacher-educators, principals of teacher education institutions and primary, secondary and early childhood teachers.
A key component of the conference will be what the university is calling the Jamaica Declaration, which will propose solutions for handling the challenges to improve performance in Mathematics and Science and inform teacher preparation and curriculum development in these crtitical subjects.
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...#ixzz1n14Xr2pY
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