PARENTS AT A popular primary school want the Ministry of Education to investigate why a teacher works two days each week, and sometimes three days, as the secretary to the principal of her school.
They want Acting Chief Education Officer Karen Best to explain why this is the second consecutive term this has been allowed to happen, while the children this teacher is supposed to teach lose quality instruction time.
One of the irate parents told Cou Cou that there seems to be an arrangement between her child’s school and a rural school to share the secretary between the principals.
So last term this teacher regularly worked three days a week in the principal’s office as her secretary from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. when the substantive secretary was at the other school.
What has this mother and others up in arms about the whole affair is that the children suffering most from this are the slow learners – already the most disadvantaged in the school.
According to the mum, the teacher involved is responsible for a special programme at the school and, based on results, does a good job. However, for those days she is playing secretary, the programme is not tutored.
The woman wants to know what’s the point of having a teacher on the timetable to teach a subject when, for two days, she does not teach the subject as she is otherwise employed.
What’s more, the mother is wondering what value is placed on the programme that it is being sacrificed the way it is? She’s also asking why a teacher is getting paid at her salary for doing secretarial work in the principal’s office.
The woman is sure the ministry knows nothing about this as this action would never be encouraged by Minister Ronald Jones.
ML on patrol
QUESTIONS ARE BEING asked why a vehicle bearing ML plates, and driven by the boss, can be seen on the streets of urban districts at all sorts of times.
Those who have witnessed this are wondering if this boss has nothing better to do.
They told Cou Cou that one explanation for the person’s high visibility could be due to their agency not doing much work these days given Government’s cash-strapped position.
Someone told Cou Cou that this boss is on the road so much, one would swear the individual is working as a postal courier.
Another said the boss has become to the road what Minister of Housing Denis Kellman has become to a radio call-in programme.
These watchers would like this person to sit with the experts in the agency and come up with a way to use what little resources their agency still has to help the underprivileged, instead of just driving around.
Group in two minds
A SELECT GROUP of influential individuals have been reportedly holding informal talks on what they should be doing given what is going on in Barbados.
Each member of the group feels something drastic needs to be done – but that is the only thing they agree on. It is understood they cannot get unanimity on what action should be taken.
One set thinks they should go public with their concerns, but others feel such decisive action could lead to some sort of reprisal which could affect their bottom lines – so they do not want to risk that.
From what Cou Cou has been able to gather, suggestions such as quietly funding a third party and establishing a blog dedicated to revealing fact from fiction have all been raised and dismissed.
A person who seems to know about the group suggests as always everyone wants to benefit but no one wants the unpleasant task of working in the trenches to ensure they get the result desired. And so, everything remains at square one.