Union questions tests for teacher recruitment despite push away from ‘exam culture’

The government’s new procedures for recruiting master teachers and education officers have been strongly condemned by the Barbados Union of Teachers , which is seeking an urgent meeting with education authorities to clarify the process.

The BUT met on Thursday evening to discuss the contentious recruitment process and has taken the position that there is too much secrecy and inequity surrounding how one qualifies for the two posts.

“The assessment process, which was repeated today, because I think this was the second one that they are undergoing that includes multiple-choice questions, short-answer questions and essays, really places persons in an unfortunate position because of the secrecy with which these assessments were shrouded,” BUT General Secretary Gilbert Carmichael told Barbados TODAY.

He explained: “Persons did not know what was coming on these exercises; they did not know what was being tested. And, I want to use the analogy of a student and a teacher. Can you imagine a teacher going into a classroom and giving an assessment without exposing the child to the contents, or not telling them what the test, or what areas of the test they would be given? So we share the same experiences and the same mindset, because we know if we were to do that, we would be called into question.

 “If this method that we have now resorted to using for these recruitment exercises, if these methods are deemed necessary, why is it that school principals are not subjected to the same rigorous screening?”

The union leader said teachers are also “very” concerned because they are not sure who would be correcting the scripts and if it is going to be a transparent exercise.

“A lot of questions are remaining,” said Carmichael. “The Barbados Union of Teachers would hope that, going forward – yes, the ministry would want to create qualified and highly competent individuals – but we do believe that the processes undertaken should be fair from the outset, so that no element of surprise would be brought to bear.”

The BUT general secretary disclosed that the next step is to engage the Ministry of Educational Transformation to get a clear understanding of what the objectives are and why they have resorted to these methodologies.

“We are unclear at this point… outside of the fact that we know we would want the best persons to be attracted to these positions, at a time when you would want to enhance your educational system, and you are looking at transformation and all these other elements. We would also want that persons are not placed in an unfortunate or stressful position,” he contended.

Carmichael insisted that if stakeholders wanted to change the system under which the country was operating, where it has been touted, even by some officials in the ministry, that they needed to move away from “this examination culture.”

“And if this is what you are moving away from, why is it that this is the methodology that you are using? We will reach out to the ministry in short order based on our discussions in our meeting today; we will do that in short order… definitely before next week turns around, we will have some correspondence to the ministry seeking clarity on the matter,” the union head said.

Last year, Chief Education Officer Dr Ramona Archer-Bradshaw announced that the creation of master teachers is among several policies the Ministry of Education is rolling out to tackle issues highlighted by educators since the previous year. Dr Archer-Bradshaw told the opening of a gender education workshop organised by the Caribbean Union of Teachers at the Barbados Beach Club in Maxwell of the initiatives the ministry was implementing to deal with the concerns of teachers. The chief education officer informed the participants that the ministry had developed a strategy to tackle the burning issues that consultations raised in 2023. 

Efforts by Barbados TODAY to reach ministry officials for comment were  unsuccessful.

emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb