Teachers’ unions on same page

The two main teachers’ unions have not seen eye to eye for several years, but the Ministry of Education can expect similar agitations from them in the coming school year.
In fact, two weeks before next week’s start of the Michaelmas term, members of the Barbados Secondary Teachers’ Union (BSTU) and the Barbados Union of Teachers (BUT) sat under the same roof to discuss recommendations for the proposed Teaching Service Commission – a suggestion from the BSTU in the 1970s.
The meeting was following through on a suggestion to that effect made by BSTU president Mary Redman at the August meeting of the Caribbean Union of Teachers in Guyana.
Redman said the meeting was “very good” while BUT president Pedro Shepherd described it as “fruitful”.
“It is going to affect teachers in Barbados, whether they are BSTU members, BUT members or non-members . . . . There seems to be the intention on the part of the BUT and the BSTU to work collaboratively, wherever possible, to discuss and address concerns to the teaching service in general,” Shepherd said.