Ronald Thwaites | What comes first?

Last week, there was the impressive opening of The Mico University College’s STEM Century International Conference. The next day, there was the welcome announcement of hundreds of scholarships for degree programmes related to science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics. This is all great news.

Hon Glen Christian, who along with colleagues like Butch Hendrickson have invested considerably in both early-childhood and STEAM infrastructure, spoke of the cramp being experienced in the manufacturing sector caused by the shortage of skilled operatives. A highly trained and motivated workforce is essential for us to move out of the slough of normalized ‘pity-mi-likkle’ economic growth.

But what comes first? All those scholarships promised at Mico and UTech will be accessible only by those who have adequate foundation in the elementary skills of literacy, numeracy and proper social habits. That is where we are short, and doing scandalously little about it.

PERPETUATING AN UNDERCLASS

As Robert Gregory reminded us on these pages last Thursday, at least a half of primary school-leavers are not sufficiently literate and numerate to perform well in high school. This number repeats and compounds itself every year, creating a growing underclass of Jamaicans unable to be sufficiently productive, and often prone to antisocial conduct.

It is not only the shortage of natural science teachers and laboratories which accounts for the pitiably few science entries in the CSEC examinations. More students can’t enter, and only a few of those who do will pass, because their foundation skills are weak.

So when we proclaim that “Jamaica must become a STEM nation” and that “STEM must solve our problems”, while enabling the teachers and workers through scholarships, show us antecedent, or at least simultaneous investment, in universal literacy, numeracy and attitudinal capacity. Chronic illiteracy can cramp the verve and devalue all the dollars of the STEAM initiative. Fifty years after the first effort, Jamaica needs a new JAMAL – this time in the schools.

FIRST THINGS FIRST

It is past surprising how this Jamaica Labour Party administration ignores the settled wisdom of their talisman Mr Seaga who, in his retirement years, expressed his conviction that the first and primordial area of educational transformation had to be the early-childhood sector.

Look at what is facing us now. Any principal and class teacher will relate how restless and unsettled students are in the wake of the COVID-19 interruption. Most schools are simply not equipped to deal with the aggravated psychosocial and behavioural problems. Government and the society at large continue to be in denial.

Even as the consequences are slapping us in the face. Campion College, one of the highly regarded high schools, has been trying to achieve an equal entry balance between preparatory and primary high-performers. But this year, the cohort assigned them is skewed against the primary graduates. Those would have been the group most affected by the charade of distance learning. That simple outcome has inevitable and disastrous consequences for the nation’s future and the likely candidates for STEAM programmes.

Who is measuring and evaluating this impending disaster which is incubating in all schools? Instead, we continue to promote ill-prepared and therefore demotivated children this September after a summer break, when, for many, regression and idleness will have aggravated their silent toll of our collective future.

Despite all this, the nodes of excellence in our schools sustain hope. The Jessie Ripoll Primary School in Kingston graduated a class which averaged 95 per cent of grade-six candidates qualifying for Pathway One, coming down from a 97.5 per cent performance before the pandemic exacted its price.

That school, operated under the control and with the philosophy of the Catholic Sisters of Mercy, was declared by the representative of the Ministry of Education as being the highest-performing primary school in the country.

Sadly, the school is able to admit less than 10 per cent of applicants. The fortunate entrants will fill the STEAM academies in the future because they have all achieved the required competencies at the pre-primary and primary levels. Their confidence and capacity were evident at their recent school-leaving exercises.

The best investment in Jamaica’s future is indisputable. It is to bring all our schools up to the standards of Campion and Jessie Ripoll and the several others (but not enough) of similar quality. For now, notwithstanding the escalating fees, inevitable because teachers have to be paid better, it is a sound investment to send your child to a preparatory school. Better than the trip abroad, the bashment clothes and the fancy electronics. Unhappily, that is not an option for the majority of us.

WHEEL AND COME AGAIN

I believe that those in charge of the education system understand this grim reality even as , courting disbelief, efforts are made to downplay the specialist teacher shortage and the continuing starvation of the early-childhood sector.

But where is the money and the personnel for the structural changes acknowledged to be needed? Soon come? August is traditionally a dormant month for education, and so the die is cast for the academic year beginning in September. And once that rhythm is resumed, the prospects for interposition of new pedagogy and structures are unlikely during the remainder of any academic year.

So big up the STEAM initiative, but do what comes first. If this is to be “Jamaica’s STEM century”, set the foundations on solid ground. Don’t let us be like those builders of heavy high-rise buildings on the side of Jack’s Hill where the soil is shaky and the area is on a well-known earthquake fault line.

Minister Nigel Clarke is moving to help those poor students who approach him to access university study – very commendable. My experience is with the larger number who could not get to the point of matriculation and worthiness for any scholarship, because their qualifications were non-existent or inadequate. The solution to their predicament is what must come first.

RELATED POSTSCRIPT

Shouldn’t we be ashamed that in the 61st year of our Independence, we are complacent in having to recruit nurses from Cuba and elsewhere for our health system when there are thousands of Jamaicans who aspire to nursing and related professions? Why can Cuba have an export industry in skilled professionals and we can’t even meet our own needs?

Set the foundations right, then add the STEAM capacity and watch the shortage reverse!

Rev Ronald G. Thwaites is an attorney-at-law. He is former member of parliament for Kingston Central and was the minister of education. He is the principal of St Michael’s College at the UWI. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.