Extended school year

Education Minister Rejects Teachers' Proposal

Government attempts to extend school year by two weeks

Teachers are considering taking industrial action over government plans to extend the school year by two weeks if there is not a guarantee that there will be a compromise by the next academic year.

The Ministry of Education decided at the beginning of the 1999 academic year to extend the school year as part of its Education Development Plan so that students could have more tutoring time.

At that time teachers voiced their objection to the ministry's decision and concerns that they were not involved in the decision making process.

Public relations officer for the St Lucia Teachers Union, Kentry Jn Pierre said that teachers were still not satisfied with the way the decision was taken and feel as though they have been left out of the loop despite being major players in the education system.

In response to concerns, the Minister of Education, Mario Michel put together a joint technical committee made up of the St Lucia Teachers Union and the National Principals' Association so that they could come up with an alternative to the extension.

Head of the National Principals' Association, Lera Pascal said: "We thought that adding two weeks to the end of the term would be more difficult for teachers to accept. We thought of making a proposal whereby instead of extending the weeks, there could be a small extension on each day. It would make it a lot more reasonable and easier to manage and accept, if half an hour was added to every day."

Ms Pascal, who is the principal of the Sir Ira Simmons Secondary School, said that the end of the term is not a very productive time since students are anticipating the vacation and the two weeks will not be fully utilised.

Through her calculation Mrs Pascal said that adding half an hour to each day would amount to fifteen days as opposed to the ten days that the Ministry's two weeks would add. "So there would be time to spare," said the Principal.

At a meeting held last week with the St Lucia Teachers Union, National Principals' Association and Ministry of Education officials the proposal was rejected. The minister said he was not convinced the time would be used constructively and asked that the organisations involved come up with a justifiable reason for their proposal.

Commenting on the minister's rejection, Ms Pascal said: "We are looking at our change for the next academic year. A longer working day does not put a burden on teachers and there is more contact with the students and that is value added. We will try to prove this to the minister."

Sourced from: The Star