ONLINE FEEDBACK

Below are excerpts from comments by our readers online at www.jamaica-gleaner.com to yesterday's lead story, 'Pricey places: Gov't spends big to put poor-performing students in private high schools'.

It is worth it

I only read the first sentence, not the entire article, and my response is, "So? What's your point? Do we understand the importance of having an educated workforce?"

Poor-performing students will not do well in public schools with up to 40 students in a classroom. If we spend the money on our poor-performing children who end up employable, IT IS WORTH IT.

- Mike Wilson

Use money to equip public schools

I am wondering how much improvement $489,456,000 could have made to equipping public schools and reducing the student-teacher ratio at the primary level, thus reducing the need to cater to "illiterate" students at the grade-nine level? Does a government that taxes reading material and computers in this day and age really have education as a priority? Just wondering.

- Maurice

Good system

It appears to me that this system being used by the Ministry of Education is a good system. My only concern at this time is that the article does not speak to the monitoring of the individual children's progress by the ministry. It only speaks to the monitoring of the private schools. If this is not being done, then this needs to be integrated into the programme, as this is how we will know if the individual students are benefiting from it.

Now, I am not saying that there might not be a better programme to deal with these students. Not being an educator, none comes readily to mind. The educators who are criticising the system cannot just stop there. They need to place their recommendations on the table for them to be considered. Again, while the article speaks to their criticism, it does not say what they are recommending as a better way to deal with this matter. It is good to criticise; however, it is better to criticise and suggest alternative courses of actions.

- Donovan Bowen

Any proof the system is working?

OK. So this is going on for some seven years! Is there any proof that it's working? Shouldn't there be some students that are about ready to graduate from those institutions?

I certainly find this a bit hard to accept! I am wondering if any one in the ministry might have connection to these institutions! The Gleaner must do an investigation to find out who those shareholders are ! And this will give a better picture as to who those students are and who recommend these institutions and why.

I believe that when it comes to education, everyone should have a fair shot, and this doesn't look like it!

-Noshel