Sorry professor, SEA has to go

THE EDITOR: This is in response to the article titled “UWI lecturer: Don’t abolish SEA” in the Sunday Newsday.
Most of us have to rely on the news reports since we were not among the audience at the Prof Jerome De Lisle’s presentation. So I am basing my response on the SEA on what I know as a former student and as a parent.

Firstly, why do we even need an examination to move from primary school to secondary school? Where I live in Canada there is a seamless movement from elementary to junior and then to senior high schools. Yes, there are provincial assessment exams but they are not make-or-break exams like the SEA. At the end of compulsory schooling there are the diploma exams (something like A-Levels or CAPE).

Eleven-year-olds are not stressed out (neither are their parents) because of one exam. Who decided that there should be an examination of this magnitude at age 11? What is so special about age 11?
Secondly, the stress and disruption in families that preparation for the SEA causes is an indisputable fact and well documented over the years. Dr David Bratt, pediatrician and former lecturer in medicine, has written many times over the past two decades on this. He is not the only one. Child psychologists, school psychologists, social scientists and educators have done the same and said the same.

Thirdly, whilst De Lisle correctly identifies the “myths” associated with the SEA he still chooses to stick with it hoping that people will change. No, they won’t. Moral suasion doesn’t work in TT. In fact, the problem has intensified.
Fourthly, the SEA has spawned an entire industry that feeds on the fears of parents and the aspirations of students. I call it the “extra lessons” industry. Things have gotten so bad that instead of the usual Standards Four and Five “inmates,” the rot has spread to Standard Three and possibly below where students are taking paid extra lessons.
And then we have the daily newspapers cashing in on the hysteria by having “practice tests” every day. Is TT a real place?

Fifthly, the annual parade of the top students is an exercise in PR for the Minister of Education to score political points and for the successful schools to have bragging rights for that year. Furthermore, the Education Ministry, the school boards, the media and other institutions reinforce the prevailing view that success in the SEA is a monumental achievement.
One media house even used the SEA “winner” in a campaign for an entire year, splashing her photo in endless ads.

Finally, I wonder if the professor’s home schooling has insulated him from the realities of what transpires in the classrooms and extra lessons rooms of Standards Four and Five students?
Sorry Prof De Lisle, the SEA has to go.

RALPH ASHTON via e-mail