PM laments shortage of male teachers

THE Prime Minister has expressed concern about the shortage of male teachers in the classrooms. As he addressed the Spotlight on Education: Transforming Education at the National Academy for the Performing Arts on Thursday night, Rowley said more men must be encouraged in the classroom to provide a balance in the children’s education.

“I love the ladies,” he said noting that he has a wife, daughters and grand-daughter. However, Rowley said the insufficient presence of male teachers is a problem.
Especially, he said, when many of the children are without fathers in their homes and a significant number are male students who have no role models or someone to even play sports with. He said the female teachers who outnumber the men are stepping up in this role.

There are 13,906 teachers in the primary and secondary schools. Of that number, 10,581 are females and 3,325 are males. The PM said who is teaching the children is one of ten strands of the fabric in which stakeholders must engage as it seeks to transform the sector.

He outlined the strands, including who gets educated, where the teaching will take place – in schools owned by the state or churches – what is going to be taught, whether the curriculum is tabled to suit the wide-cross section and differences that make up the population, and the selection process to get into these schools.

As a boy, he said, the selection process was the Common Entrance examination, which was based on merit. “When you hear people abusing the phrase common entrance like some murderous arrival, it was liberation. Changes to Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) is still a principle of selection.”

Weighing in on the pros and cons for changing this 11-plus examination for transition from the primary to secondary school, “into something else”, Rowley said he was waiting to hear what was that “something else.”

“If you never hear the conversation end with what that “something” is going to be, I think it is because the advocates know that there is going to be contention there.
“The time has come for us to bite that bullet. There are other systems available in the world. The question is do we want any of those systems? Can we tolerate any of those systems? Can we fund those systems? Can we accept those systems in a plural society?”

Rowley said he is anxious to hear from the experts what are the alternatives to SEA. Rowley predicted in the transformation process, “potential for trouble is there,” but asserted his government will not shy away as it needs to be done.
He said the first People’s National Movement (PNM) government made a commitment to fund education and as the first of his siblings to benefit from a secondary and tertiary education, his government is committed to offering every child an opportunity for a good education.