The lost Art of

CSEC MAY/JUNE 2013 Subjects with unsatisfactory performances Grades I to III 2012 2013 % % Mathematics 29.69 28.92 English A 37.02 45.69 Clothing & Textiles 76.83 47.11
Subjects with satisfactory performances at CXC Grade 1 3 passes (www.education.gov.gy) 2012 2013 % % Agriculture Science DA* 90.11 96.21 Agriculture Science SA* 93.48 93.74 Biology 63.33 64.80 Caribbean History 65.15 54.33 Chemistry 46.41 52.39 Economics* 63.15 78.57 English B 56.5 61.06 Food & Nutrition* 86.85 80.94 French* 85.41 85.71 Geography 51.58 52.05 Home Ec. Management 82.83 73.01 Information Technology (Gen) * 79.49 75.58 Integrated Science* 80.76 75.58 Ofce Administration 72.71 68.91 Physics 68.69 54.34 Principles of Accounts 53.74 71.95 Principles of Business 71.12 69.55 Religious Education * 100 78.89 Social Studies 68.26 60.25 Spanish 59.57 66.26 Technical Drawing 61.14 64.63 Theatre Arts* 98.46 98.82 Visual Arts 44.51 61.40 Elec. Doc Prep & Management* 85.6 89.99 Physical Education & Sport* 97.5 98.44 Human & Social Biology 55.84 61.38 Additional Mathematics* 58.33 80.83 Building Technology (Const)* 83.34 87.38 Building Technology (Woods) * 63.37 81.08 Electrical & Electronic Tech 58.48 60.35 Mechanical Engineering Tech * 78.15 78.62 * indicates subjects with excellent performances at Grade One to Grade Three

Understanding & Expressing Ourselves For two year period 2012-2013, as CXCs dismal English, Math performance persists in failure

STABROEK NEWS, Tuesday August 27, 2013

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by Shaun Michael Samaroo

Out of 27,500 school children who wrote CXC, in the last two years, 16,100 failed to pass English Language, the mother tongue, and only language, of the Guyanese nation. Only 11,300 of those 27,500 school leavers passed with Grades one to three. Those 16,100 school leavers, in failing English, automatically became disqualied from a university education, as the University of Guyana requires a Grade One to Three pass as a necessity for enrolment. Of the 13,650 teenagers who wrote English this year, 6,200 failed more than half of the total number of kids who wrote the exam.

Such high failures in English alarm everyone. Government, community leaders, the political Opposition, social groups and citizens across the land express frustration and disgust at such alarming failures, year after year. Yet, few generate a workable solution. Stabroek News delved into the state of illiteracy in the Guyanese society, seeking the root cause of why the nation fails to plug such a gaping wound in the social fabric. Despite deep visions and decades of Government and private sector investment in educating the Guyanese society, the 54 percent failure rate at this years CXC English presents a picture of devastating failure. This newspaper surveyed the education sector,

16,000 kids fail English

Government and the wider society remain passive about the problem, failing to generate urgent action to solve this invisible weakening of the social structure of the society. Within the education sector itself, the brain drain and lack of human capital affect how leaders research, initiate and execute education reform, vision and programmes. The brain drain and low rate of literacy affect the education sector itself. One of the crucial problems stiing the nding of a workable solution to the crisis involves the attitude of teachers, ofcials, leaders and programme directors within the State-run education system. This newspaper spoke to several teachers working in State schools, in Georgetown and Berbice. We spoke with leaders. We engaged programme directors. Across the board, we found people within the system expressing serious reservation about being able to talk openly about the crisis. Teachers became adamant in demanding that we did not name them. They criticized freely, but requested anonymity. This lack of openness in facing the crisis sees the problem become invisible. No one mentions the 16,100 school leavers who failed English, and the thousands more who failed Math. Government leaders, year after year, parade, tout and celebrate a select few top students, who achieve as-tonishing success. In 2013, the Minister of Education Ms Priya Man-ickchand, praised the per-formance of a few students who passed record-break-ing number of subjects, Turn to Page 4A

talking to teachers, ofcials, leaders, parents and kids about the state of our human resource capital, resulting in this feature story. The Guyanese society suffers from the worlds most debilitating brain drain problem, with world reports listing Guyana at the top of the brain drain list. An incredulous 89 percent of skilled Guyanese migrate. This devastating brain drain through migration, coupled with the alarming rate of illiteracy in the society, creates a social quagmire that sties national development.

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STABROEK NEWS, Tuesday, August 27, 2013 initiatives failed, and a national literacy consultancy last year involving the top ofcials of the Ministry of Education failed to produce any workable result to date. Over the past two decades, Government budgeted over US$1B to the education sector, and this year Education takes up the largest chunk of the national budget. The previous Education Minister, Shaik Baksh, drafted an Education White Paper when he served as Minister, and said that: Education is generally regarded as a basic requirement for the socio-economic transformation and advancement of societies. It is a prime ingredient in human resource development and the overall development of a nation. This is well recognized by the Government of Guyana and education reform exercises are therefore a regular feature of the Governments development agenda. Bakshs detailed Paper included an Education Vision, problems and challenges facing the sector, and strategies for rapid education reform. The development of this strategic plan was based on a participatory approach involving all stakeholders, including development partners, through a series of consultations to outline the challenges and impediments to education and to plan the way forward. The resulting strategy is the fourth in a series of education plans developed over the last two decades. It represents the priority policies and strategies that Guyana needs to pursue to make the country competitive in the global economy, as well as to realise its national development aspirations. It spells out clearly the vision and mission and provides philosophical rationales for the core values and the mandate of the Ministry of Education. It identies and explains the major issues and constraints in the development of education and outlines the major strategic activities to be implemented to attain the desired policy objectives, Baksh said in his Foreward to the Paper. Several years later, those lofty words seem like idle rhetoric, with 2013 CXC results seeing over 6,200 Guyanese young people failing English, a 54 percent failure rate. Yet, his 2008-2013

Turn to Page 4A most with distinction. In fact, the Ministry released a list of the top performing students, and used this statistic to proclaim overall success at the CXC exams. No one mentioned how many students failed. Statistics and percentages masked the real devastation of CXC 2013. The Ministry explained its rationale thus on its website (www.education.gov.gy): Full analysis of individual candidates performances is not yet available. We have requested however, a list of candidates who have secured Grade Ones passes in eight or more subjects from the Caribbean Examinations Council. In response to our request for the list of persons who have secured Grade One passes in eight or more subjects, we received a list of two hundred and thirty-one (231) candidates, compared to one hundred and seventy ve (175) in 2012. Of these, sixty-nine (69) students secured 11 Grade Ones or more as opposed to forty (40) in 2012. This emphasis on the 231 students who achieved outstanding passes became the ministry mantra that associated success with this statistic. No details came out about the 13,000 plus other students, except in abstract percentages. The failure rate in English and Math became an invisible problem, masked in abstract percentage points. The Ministry released the names, schools and detailed results of these 231 students, including their grade levels, emphasizing the grade ones. Apart from these 231 students, the Ministry did not release a list of the names, schools and grades of the other 13,000 plus students. Yet, Minister Manickchand maintains an open, interested posture towards the illiteracy crisis. The Minister is engaging, open and willing to work on a solution. This newspaper found her attitude to the crisis to be encouraging, and should she come across a workable solution, would gladly throw her energy behind it. She cares. In fact, one cannot fault the Government or Education system for want of trying. Several literacy

There is a literacy problem in Guyana. Indeed it is estimated that there is a 21 percent rate of absolute literacy in Guyana, and an overall functional literacy rate that is just over 50 percent. This state of affairs is due in part to weaknesses in the education system and in part to the absence of a culture of literacy in many home environments. As a result of this constraint many students graduate with low levels of literacy and have little or no opportunity of developing into functionally literate citizens.

Society suffers poor comprehension and composing skills

In English Language and Math, CXC does not offer SBAs, and this fact could explain why students across the region register high fail rates at these subjects
Education Strategic Plan is the fourth in a series of education plans during the last two decades. It is an effort to identify the priority policies and strategies Guyanas education system needs to pursue in order to signicantly improve its quality of output and help Guyana to meet the challenges posed by globalization and rapid technological changes, the Paper said. In his Paper, then Minister Baksh noted some serious challenges, including Literacy results in Reading and Language Arts low. Nearly 70% of each cohort fails to reach an acceptable standard. Teachers need constant support in implementing the new methodology. Some are not doing it. A high number of outof-school youth and adults with inadequate literacy skills exist. Bakshs solution to that crisis of nearly 70 percent failing to read and write at acceptable standard, aimed to instil new literacy methodology to be implemented in all schools. More regular and systematic support and supervision for teachers. Remediation programmes to be put in place for those not meeting standards. IRI mathematics programme to be implemented in Grade 3. An increased number of schools will be supported with innovative technology (computers etc.) for literacy and numeracy education. Those lofty goals seem, in 2013, like a distant dream. Noted Guyanese diplomat and writer, Odeen Ishmael, also released a book in 2012, comprising a collection of articles he wrote on the education sector. Ishmael included a note from the late President of Guyana, Dr Cheddi Jagan, that shared his belief that Education forms the foundation for developing the society: Education and culture, education and development, culture and development: these are all inter-related questions to which development strategists are paying increasing attention. For too long, development has been looked at mainly as economic nance, technology, expertise. But it is more and more being realized that the human factor is a most, if not the most, important ingredient to success. Ishmael chronicled the historical development of Guyana, and listed the decades of emphasis on education, including the establishment of free and fair education from nursery to university, and opening of the University of Guyana. These public documents, along with the effort of todays Government through the national budget, show that the country places Education at the forefront of its development. And yet, failure results. Despite severe inefciencies, unprofessional management ethics, poor leadership at several levels of the system, and the im-

- Guyanas National Development Strategy, Ch 18

Page 5A STABROEK NEWS, Tuesday, August 27, 2013 glish in the public school one Math teacher said shes system, says that English excited about this, because and Math do not require it means my students will School Based Assessment get 100 passes. If we have marks, and this is a crucial SBA for Math, next year, factor. youll see a miraculous rise The task of complet- in pass rates, the teacher ing School Based Assess- said. ments, known as SBAs in Another teacher also the education system, al- said that the six hours the lows students writing CXC Ministry of Education to complete assignments mandates to teach English throughout the school year, at public schools cannot outside of an examination train students in the crusetting, that are marked as cial skills of comprehennal examination marks. sion and composition. Our The SBA for each subject society faces a fundamental comprises class work, eld problem: people cannot unresearch and home assign- derstand written language, ments. and express themselves SBAs can be a properly. We see this in our breeze, as parents and students. We see this in the teachers and others help the general society. So the Minstudent rene and complete istry teaches structured EnSBAs so that they receive glish for six hours a week, high marks. Students who and the student then goes have academic parents or out to encounter the world family, and who can work out there where theres no with their teachers well, structured English. English generally do well at SBAs, is about practice. You pracfrom my observation, the tice reading and writing. teacher, who requested not And the schools fail to to be named in this report, get kids to practice the art said. of writing, and the art of SBAs could make reading. So examination up as much as 50 percent ofcers complain that CXC of the nal marks in CXC students cannot compresubjects. Most subjects of- hend questions, and thus fered at CXC level require compose answers that fail. SBAs, and thus all a stuIn a remedial program dent has to do is achieve at a private city school, stuthe 50+ marks in SBAs, to dents who failed English stand an excellent chance the year before receive 25 of passing the written ex- hours of English practice, amination. per week. This explains why This year, these stustudents can write many, dents registered a 100 permany subjects. They com- cent pass rate, when they plete most of the examin- re-wrote CXC English. ing through SBAs, so the The private school nal written exanimation offers lessons outside the is not that big a deal. Of public school system, and course the student has to attracts a student popube focused and disciplined, lation of over 700. The and love learning. But public education system achieving passes at many would collapse without subjects is based, really, on private schools and private DAUNTING LITERACY CHALLENGES: Minister of Education, Ms Priya Manickchand SBAs, not so much on nal lessons, one teacher said. examination writing in an Another teacher notWe in Guyana, whether we are within or outside the formal education system, examination setting, one ed that Caribbean stuteacher said. dents fail English, as well, must commit ourselves to the furtherance of the noble goal raising the levels of In English Language because other teachers of literacy in our countryit is not only about raising the standard of education but and Math, however, CXC other subjects ignore bad improving the quality of life in Guyana, does not offer SBAs, and English. this fact explains why stuThey look at content dents across the region of answer to questions, - Minister of Education, Ms Priya Manickchand, September 9, 2012 (GINA) register high fail rates at so if a Social Studies stupact of the brain drain and April 1975, the Minis- gertips, do we see 16,100 tion marking method may these subjects, the teach- dent writes bad grammar high rate of illiteracy on the ter of Education, Ceciline of our young people failing lie at the root of the prob- er, who got the backing of or constructs a sentence education system itself, the Baird, admitting that edu- at CXC English, within a lem. other teachers for this the- poorly, the teacher genThis may reect why ory, said. Students writing erally overlooks it, and society stands fully aware cational standards were de- short two year period? Stabroek News, in its poor English and Math re- English and Math go into marks for content even and conscious of the value clining, publicly declared of education to national de- that three-quarters of the research for this report, sults span the Caribbean, the examination room with at CXC level. velopment, and its current children leaving primary found that teachers hold and not just Guyana. zero marks, unlike the other We have lost the culMinistry of Education subjects where they would ture of respecting English crisis of literacy. schools cannot read and diverse views about how to ofcials, in fact, excuse the have accumulated marks as a foundation to life itsolve the crisis. Despite that aware- write properly. While some say that crisis away with the view through SBAs. Only one self. We lost our ability ness, however, a workable Teachers this newspaliteracy solution still eludes per spoke with express the poor supervisory skills that the whole Caribbean or two other subjects do not to simply understand, to cause the problems, and suffers, not just Guyana. this nation. same sentiment today. require SBAs, the teacher comprehend, and to comOne teacher at a pri- said. The illiteracy probSo whats the problem? others blame the Ministry pose and engage in struclem plagued this nation for Why, in todays Guyana, for lacking a solid literacy vate school, who teaches In fact, CXC plans to tured expression. We lack a long time, and Ishmael with access to the global strategy, most say that the remedial English to stu- introduce an SBA system comprehension and writin his book noted that in knowledge pool at our n- methodology and examina- dents who fail CXC En- for Math from 2014, and ing skills.

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Although Guyanas educational system was considered to be one of the best in the Caribbean during the 1960s, it is probably among the weakest today

Big delays derail education plan

-- Guyanas National Development Strategy, Ch 18
Former Education Minister Shaik Bakshs White Paper on Education, the 2008-2013 Education Strategic Plan, serves as the foundation vision for the education system today. The Ministry of Education updated Bakshs projections for reform, on April 22 last, noting the following on its website at www.education.gov.gy: Various factors have constrained the Ministrys efforts to achieve its literacy objectives. There were some delays in making decisions about the material/ textbooks to be used; in acquiring the material once the decisions were made; and in employing cluster advisors and master teachers to train and support the teachers in new methodologies. In general there were some questions about the effectiveness and sustainability of the proposed Cascade training model for teachers. "The result of these delays was that teachers were not trained on time, they were not clear on what they should be do-ing and they have not re-ceived the level of support needed. This, combined with a natural reluctance to change, means that little or nothing has been done in some schools. There have been some small pockets of success in the last two years, for example, in some schools in Region 6 and in some of the CCETT pilot schools. The major lessons learnt from the modest success in these institutions are that the teachers need clear directions and a great deal of supportive supervision. A revised model for supporting teachers at the school level has been put in place. In this model each school has one competent member of staff, versed in the new methodologies, as a master teacher who provides support to colleagues and along with the head teacher, ensures that the new methodologies are sustained. Poor literacy achievement at the primary level impacts on secondary achievement and even constrains achievement in the technical and vocational institutions. In brief, there is a cohort of persons in the society who are either functionally or absolutely illiterate. The Ministry has recognised the urgent need to take action and has introduced the Fast Track Literacy Programme aimed at different target groups such as poor performers in primary schools, out-ofschool youth and the general adult population. This programme is being implemented in close collaboration with non-governmental organisations that are engaged in promoting literacy. The Ministry intends to maintain these efforts for

EDUCATION INNOVATOR: Former Education Minister, Mr Shaik Baksh, wrote an Education White Paper for a strategic vision, spanning 2008-2013 The end result of all of these delays was that teachers were not trained on time, they were not clear on what they should be doing and they have not received the level of support needed
at least three years in the new plan period. "There were delays in getting the Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI) programme in mathematics started. 2003-2007 plan anticipated that by the end of the plan period IRI in mathematics up to Grade 3 would have been nationally implemented. Delays in the procurement of the radios, development and approval of the lessons to be delivered and inadequate supervision have resulted in a time lag of just over a year in the achievement of this objective. The results of tests carried out by the Measurement and Evaluation Unit of MOE however reveal that there has been some improvement in achievement in mathematics when measured against baseline data collected under the BEAMS project. While the average score has improved, it remains well below 50%. This therefore continues to be an area of major concern at both the primary and secondary levels. Also, Television programmes focusing on English and Mathematics were developed, aired on one of the major channels and saved on CDs and sent to schools, the Miniustry says on its website. The Ministry operates a controversial TV Learning Channel that reaches hinterland communities, costing more than US$1M, Critics claim it achieves negligible literacy results, and fails to see kids practice reading and writing

The fourth annual Education for All Global Monitoring Report states There are reasons why literacy is at the core of Education for All (EFA) a good quality basic education equips pupils with literacy skills for life and further learning... literate people are better able to access continuing education opportunities; and literate societies are better geared to meet development challenges. Poor literacy and numeracy skills were identied as strategic challenges which the Ministry of Education needed to overcome in the consultations for the 2003-2007 Education Plan and that plan had as a major objective to improve the quality of the delivery of education, especially in the area of literacy and numeracy. The concern for, and the importance of, literacy were reiterated in the consultations for this new plan. Improved literacy is still regarded by all stakeholders as the most crucial objective for the Ministry of Education and it is regarded as critical for the mastery of othersubjects. - Guyana Ministry of Education website