School meals and maxi-taxis

TTUTA

OVER THE past year there has been an incredible level of obsession by the Ministry of Education regarding the issues of school meals and maxi-taxi transport. There is a big difference between getting value for money and trying to avoid saying that the country can no longer afford to carry this social responsibility.

School officials are being bombarded on a weekly basis to submit the same data and information. It’s as if they are being bullied into reducing the number of students who receive school meals and free transport.

In the past, school officials would simply ask parents and students if they were interested in these services, the relevant data collected and forwarded to the Ministry of Education. There may be the need to adjust the request lists somewhat based on the discretion of school officials but that was good enough.

Let us not forget that the responsibility for receiving and distributing both breakfasts and lunches fall outside the remit of teachers and as such school administrators have to depend on the generosity and kind-heartedness of teachers to carry out this exercise on a daily basis.

However, school officials are now being asked to virtually carry out a means test to determine the suitability of students to receive this service. Not being social workers, school officials have to make tough judgment calls regarding which students deserve food/transport or not.

It is grossly unfair to place these officials in such a position. If the authorities would like to know if students are deserving of this service then they can go to the Ministry of Social Development and seek their guidance on the issue. That is their remit under the law.

While the National Schools Dietary Services Ltd will vehemently deny it, many school officials will insist that there has been a marked decline in the quality and quantity of school meals over the past year or so, their quality control officers consistently insisting that the meals provided are well within the guidelines provided by the Ministry of Education. A good idea might be to ask the students themselves and they might be shocked.

The same applies to the maxi-taxi service. School officials are being asked to monitor maxi-taxis contracted by the Ministry of Education through PTSC to ensure they transport designated students to and from school. Teachers are now required to stand at the school gate and ensure that certain students are transported by specific maxi-taxis on mornings and evenings consistent with a list that was supplied to the authorities in advance.

This monitoring further requires that the principal or some designated official sign and stamp a document kept by the driver as proof that they have delivered the service as a precondition for payment by PTSC.

The sheer absurdity of this arrangement is beyond comprehension. How is a principal going to ensure that specified students are picked up from their respective addresses and brought to school on mornings or taken from school on evenings and dropped at their designated address? Surely this task falls outside the remit of all school officials, not to mention well outside their designated working hours. Some vehicles deliver students to the school gate well before seven in the morning and pick up students beyond four in the evenings, depending on the routes and trips for which they are contracted.

If PTSC and the Ministry of Education want to monitor this service so closely, then people should be out there on the roads conducting such surveillance. It is unreasonable and unfair to ask school officials to do this, not to mention the fact that it is an unlawful instruction. What is even worse is that school officials are not privy to the terms of engagement/contract entered into between the ministry, PTSC and the maxi-taxi drivers, yet they are being asked to enforce same.

These two issues dominate every meeting called between the hierarchy of the ministry and school officials over the past year. Never mind the myriad of other issues that are crying out for attention at the nation’s schools. It is nothing short of trivialising school administrations and de-emphasising the delivery of curriculum.

It is indeed worrisome that the primary focus of the Ministry of Education seems to be the reduction of school meals and elimination of ghost students on maxi-taxis. In this cost-cutting exercise many deserving students are being denied a valuable social service.