Many schools without supplies; still awaiting grant

by Anesta Henry

With the school term now into its second week, public primary schools are still awaiting grants from the Ministry of Education to purchase essential items to keep the school plants in effective operation mode in the current COVID-19 environment.

President of the Association of Public Primary Schools Principals, Dr Hyacinth Harris, told the media today that the association was hoping Ministry personnel would get the grants to the schools as soon as possible.

The principal of St Bartholomew Primary School explained that with the adjustments to timetables and general operations, the reopening of schools had not
been easy for principals.

She indicated that even though the proceedings went relatively smooth on day one, it has been a difficult process thus far, because “many of the resources that they have asked for are not forthcoming”.

Harris explained that some schools which have chosen to utilise the online teaching system are still awaiting devices from the Ministry of Education to distribute to students.

“I believe the Ministry is working to get the devices into the schools. The schools received the PPE [Personal Protective Equipment], and they received limited supplies of alcohol, masks for students and staff, and that was perhaps most of it. But the other resources that most of the schools have been asking for, they have not as yet received. They have not received their grants as yet so that they can purchase additional items that will be needed,” she noted.

“We are hoping that these grants will be disbursed as soon as possible because unless we have some money, it is going to be difficult to function as we would want to, especially since we are going to need to be continuously sanitising the plant and so on.”

The principal commended her counterparts for the effort they have made in ensuring that all that was necessary was done to ensure students were able to return to school.

Harris said principals worked hard and overtime, including weekends, to ensure that their school plants were ready for the start of the 2020-2021 term.

“And some principals spent personal funds to ensure that they had the facilities up to mark.

“So kudos to them for all that they have done, and we hope that within the upcoming weeks that personnel within the Ministry of Education will continue to respond to our needs,” she added.

Primary schools reopened on September 14 for planning week, to allow principals to communicate with their staff and to decide whether the Ministry’s proposed blended teaching or face-to-face approach would be taken when students returned the following week.

Harris said that even before the September 14 reopening, principals were planning for a return to school in the COVID-19 environment, especially given that each school had to deal with unique factors that would determine how they would have to function.

“Each primary school principal, nursery school principal, and special needs school principal, was expected to design an approach that was fitting for the environment at which they were functioning. The Ministry of Education recommended the blended approach and the shift system.

“However, they were not averse to the face-to-face traditional system and this particular approach would have been applicable to smaller primary schools with small student rolls; and those schools that had the facilities, the physical plant would be suitable for that kind of approach.

“Here at St Bartholomew this is what we did, we did the face-to-face approach,” she explained.

An effort for comment from Minster of Education Santia Bradshaw was unsuccessful when messaged at Parliament today.

When Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education Senator Rommell Springer was contacted this evening, he referred any response to Bradshaw.
anestahenry@barbadostoday.bb