BSTU praises ministry’s school repair efforts

Despite 20 schools opening a week late this new school year, and with another closed for an additional week just hours after opening yesterday, one of the two teachers’ unions has praised the Ministry of Education’s annual repair efforts.

President of the Barbados Secondary Teachers’ Union (BSTU) Mary Redman said that even though everything within the summer repair programme has not gone to script, teachers are appreciative that at long last the Ministry of Education was addressing years of complaints about deteriorating plants.

She contended that while there are several hiccups in readying schools for the new school year, a number of them are much improved after being repaired under this year’s programme.

Following a meeting of BSTU members at the headquarters of the National Union of Public Workers, Redman told reporters: “The schools have been neglected for years and I think all of Barbados knows that.

“Teachers have been falling ill, students have been falling ill and we are very appreciative of the effort that has been made to get the schools ready.

“Really and truly in terms of where a lot of the schools were in terms of the repairs that they needed, they are on the road to some improvement.”

On Monday, parents of Belmont Primary School pupils found wet paint and portable toilets as a stop-gap measure while the school’s toilets are upgraded. But Redman argued that the year-old administration’s first major summer repair programme was simply not enough time to right years of neglect, suggesting that the process was only beginning.

Redman said: “They didn’t even start at the beginning of summer because there were problems with contracts and so on, but nine weeks could never have been enough time to undertake the type of work and the quantity of work that needed to be done in some schools.

“This is just the tip of the iceberg; we understand that there are limited resources and that the rest of the renovations and refurbishments will take time but the teachers are grateful and many of them have gone into conditions that are really improved over what they left the last term.”

But the BSTU’s leader revealed that at today’s meeting, her members complained of a rodent infestation at Princess Margaret and Lester Vaughn secondary schools. She explained that her union intends to write the education ministry immediately to have the infestations addressed with urgency.

Redman told reporters: “Some of our teachers did complain here today about conditions in their schools, in particular, Princess Margaret and Lester Vaughn.

“At both schools there seem to be a rodent problem. So, we are going to be writing to the Ministry of Education in that regard.”

Also discussed at today’s meeting, the first of two strategy sessions held each year, the main talking points were the union’s demand that protocols be established for the transfer of teachers, teacher evaluation and the determination of seniority.