The educational pivot (Pt 2)

This is the final of a two-part series on education. The writer argued in the end of the first instalment that the policy of free education introduced by the Michael Manley administration in 1973 was costly and, thus, adversely impacted the financial viability of other social programmes.

Edward Seaga, Contributor

TO BUTTRESS these fundamental policies, other critical shortcomings had to be dealt with:

Provision of a small meal of a nutrified bun and a bottle of milk for primary school students was organised in 1970-71 and implemented soon thereafter.

An attempt was made to provide uniforms for students in primary schools in the 1980s.

Most important, to overcome the absence of textbooks for students, again at primary schools, special texts were prepared on the most important core subjects and produced as cheaply as possible for mass distribution at the primary level in the 1980s. This was the first time most students would have textbooks in primary schools.

These supplementary improvements were not always functional. Supply of school lunches never reached all students; uniforms for primary school students was started in the 1980s but was soon discontinued. But more books on other core subjects were added. Eventually, free education was abandoned in the1990s and recently replaced by free tuition.

Would this comprehensive overhaul of the education system achieve the ultimate objective of creating an effective system for producing educated students? Let us examine what progress was made.

The range and scope of these sweeping programmes of assistance in school: meals, uniforms, books and financing, along with provision of more trained teachers should have meant significant improvement in school-leaving GCE exam scores over the first four decades of independence, notwithstanding some stops and starts in the programme, but that was not the case. At the turn of the century, 40 years after the fundamental reforms were initiated, demonstration of educational preparedness by students was still most inadequate.

Only some 30 per cent of the school leavers had sufficient passes to demonstrate that they had coped successfully with secondary education and, correspondingly, some 70 per cent could not cope. This is why Education Minister Edwin Allen reserved 70 per cent of the places in secondary schools for primary schools students 40 years before, because they were not educationally ready to cope with secondary education.

Early childhood education

But similarity of the data does not rest only on the educational inadequacies of students in primary and secondary schools. What about early childhood education, the inadequacies of which I brought fully to national scrutiny a little over a decade ago? When the same comparison on aptitude was made, it was found that only 30 per cent of the total number of students entering primary schools from early childhood institutions were ready; 70 per cent were not. Do the figures sound familiar?

The conclusion to be drawn is that the inability of students to cope with the education system from the early childhood level to primary, and from primary to secondary has not changed despite extensive reform programmes over the last 40 years or more.

Some degree of confirmation of this is to be found in the report of the Grade Four Numeracy Test 2009, published on April 28 which showed that some 60 per cent of all students at the primary level were not numerate. This incredible result is why today we are baffled, unlike the farmer who, when asked the way by a motorist to a certain destination, replied: "Go down the road til you reach a corner. When yu tek the corner you will see a fork in the road. Tek it!"

Possible way out

Ironically, the current economic crisis presents a possible way out. The Jamaican economy today is in deep distress, not only from the recession which commenced in 2008, but from the underlying economic recessional conditions of the last nearly 40 years which have shown economic growth of little or no significance in only three years. This has made Jamaica a very special case for very special attention. The programme of assistance offered by the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and other multilateral banks will not do more than overcome the problems of the current recession in the next two years or more. After that, the preceding recessionary conditions which created a virtually crippled economy will still exist and will not go away without further special assistance based on new programmes designed to lift the country up and out of the mire of the last 40 years.

To meet this crucial challenge of overcoming the original recessionary conditions which preceded 2008, programmes for special financing to provide maximum attention for education as the main thrust which can rescue the country from poverty must be developed. But this will be impossible if it is attempted to tackle the problems of the sector broadly at one time. A radically different approach must be used, to isolate for special and urgent attention the catalytic nerve centre of the overall problem of education: literacy and numeracy. Eliminate illiteracy and lack of numeracy skills and the immense problem of creating an educated nation will be greatly reduced in scope.

Faulty vehicles

Students unable to cope with literacy and numeracy are like vehicles with all tyres punctured; they are grounded and cannot move, their education has virtually ended, leaving them stranded among that 70 per cent group of students who eventually will drop out of secondary schools with virtually no passes at all. The solution to this crucial problem is straight forward: fix the tyres first. This is comparatively easy and inexpensive. The vehicle will then be mobile again. A mobile vehicle can assist in dealing with the other problems of incapacitation which an immobile vehicle cannot.

Putting this into educational terms: Fix literacy and numeracy first by devoting to them as much of the 100 per cent of curriculum time available for the first two years of primary school in order to produce schools with substantial numbers of numeric and literate students throughout the education system. Thereafter, the rest of the curriculum: science, history, geography and so on can then be tackled in the remaining four years of primary schooling which will be much easier to complete with students who have become accomplished in literacy and numeracy.

The success of this restructuring of the curriculum would create a strong platform for secondary and tertiary education.

The feared grade four literacy and numeracy test would then be fearsome no more. With mastery of literacy and numeracy broadly accomplished at the primary level, the results would set the stage for similar results in the GSAT exam which selects students for secondary schools. High levels of literacy and numeracy in secondary schools would produce higher numbers of graduates with more passes ready to move on to tertiary education and higher learning. The 70 per cent failure rate would be reduced to a significantly lower number, introducing a spectacular transformation increase of the number of skilled graduates.

Minimal cost

The cost for this transformation is minimal as the prioritisation of training in literacy and numeracy would have no extra costs. The extra funding required would be the necessary requirement to obtain increased student loan funding to meet the higher number of trained, skilled graduates. This is the key to a future labour force with more employable workers and less unemployment. The Jamaican economy must move to strengthen its human resource sector as one of the only two sectors remaining with great scope for substantial development. This must be the focus of the next major development thrust to work with the World Bank and other multinational institutions if the Jamaican economy is once again to resume robust growth and future prosperity.

A prioritised literacy and numeracy programme would make education the axis on which the country could pivot its future from hopelessness to hopefulness, with minimal cost, a truly revolutionary transformation. As education advances poverty would recede because, using my own quotation:

There is no educated country that is poor, and no poor country that is educated. If prosperity is the goal, higher skills are the tools and knowledge is the way.

To become an educated country would now be in our grasp.

Edward Seaga is a former prime minister. he is now the pro-chancellor of UTech and a distinguished fellow at the UWI. Email: odf@uwimona.edu.jm or columns@gleanerjm.com