This week the minister of Education announced his intention about reforming secondary education for the students to be able to compete and cope in university overseas. The remarks that we are not up to standard are partly justified and at the same time an insult to the teachers and all those involved in the education process. While the intent may be correct, the approach is not. They should be praised, not demeaned; indeed he must be concerned and if with good intention should rectify the situation.

The minister should know that this is the same system where he graduated and all of us who are who we are. It is not true that we cannot compete with others in foreign universities. We are better in some cases but lag behind in others. To say bluntly that we cannot measure to others is a misstatement, There is no doubt in my mind that, in certain discipline, we must catch up with others, who most certainly benefit from the richness of their society but the generalization of his comments does not stand any ground and is a cheap shot aimed at his predecessor and an insult to the teaching profession. Can he find anything good about the Mauritian system of education and his predecessor Mr Obeegadoo? Or anyone else for that matter...

Politicians have an overall responsibility to protect and safeguard our safety net and in education let the academics do their jobs. They are the experts not the politicians. Politicians will always have a say by laying down the parameters in fiscal responsibility only. Notwithstanding the political ideologies, the education policy has been consistent with the need and expectation of educators and others except in some areas.

True the system of education and the curriculum need to be changed to adapt to changing societies and to compete in the global market. Is that what we need or want? Mauritius needs a sustainable education system and stability not only for educators and parents but also for the sanity of the students and taxpayers.

Accountability and good governance

The ministry of Education must have guidance counsellors and advisers to help high school students in their choice of subjects and careers. In that respect, the personnel has to be retrained and upgraded to meet those challenges. Teachers have to be empowered with new tools to face the situation. If need be, teachers have to take refresher courses to meet the new curriculum in international standards for those wishing to pursue further studies. The ministry of Education, the University of Mauritius and the Institute of Education have highly qualified staff to train the personnel for that matter.

This question can only be answered by a commission of inquiry in education. The commission can set up the road map and suggest a vision and an action plan to guide the politicians on the necessary actions to be taken which will include the values, goals programmes of schools as well as a system of accountability and good governance. This, if has not already been done. Because politicians come and go, it is paramount that a blueprint for the next decade must be prepared and executed. Let the experts and stakeholders in both private and public sectors participate in the commission. We should decide the need of our labour forces and each industrial sector has a different need. Unlike politicians who try to garnish popularity contest, educators and actors in the field try to maximize their efforts for the well being of the student population. Conflict arises in the goals and aspirations of the politician against that of the ?pedagogue?. We cannot produce computer scientists to work in the fishing industry nor produce teachers to work in service industries, nor bricklayers to do gourmet cooking.

Pool of excellent pedagogues

The planning should include business leaders, managers, union leaders, teachers, parents and government officials. Decisions made from the top only often conflict with those assigned to execute and implement them. Mauritius has a pool of excellent ?pedagogues?. If these same people can teach in universities abroad, then why are they not performing to the task? What is holding them back? It is up to the minister to find out why the curriculum programme structure, accountability, funding, teacher professionalism, teacher experiences, working conditions and teacher empowerment have been short-changed. Please remember that ?Planning without action is awful and Action without planning is pitiful?.

The politics of fear and retribution is not new to this government. Blaming others for their political ideology is just finding a mere scapegoat rather than facing the music and accepting to discharge those responsibilities with accountability.

Krishna NAIR

Change for the better, not for the sake of change

Less than three years ago, our generation of parents had to face a dilemma that no other generation of parents in this country has ever had to face: the end of the ?rat race? brought with it a choice, which many of us would have preferred not to have had to make. It was not a choice amongst schools with a defined identity, philosophy and a mission statement; rather it was a choice between, at best, one construction site and another. Choosing the right construction site was one of the biggest decisions we would ever have to make for our children, and since we are no longer allowed to choose their life partners, it was perhaps the biggest.

We ran the gauntlet and hushed our anxieties. The uncertainties we shared as parents, we tried to keep them away from our children. As educators, we questioned the reform, but as parents, we embraced it, for, whatever may be said about the ?Obeegadoo Reform?, that it may have been too hasty, insufficiently planned, and unilateral, one has to be of terribly bad faith not to admit that it was a step in the right direction.

Nevertheless, the uncertainties surrounding it may have had a high emotional cost for the children, in the middle of it all. They were working towards an examination in which they did not know which subjects would be sanctioned and they were hoping for schools they knew their hard work would not get them into. The rubble they were shown as their future schools was hardly motivating and the silent apprehensions of their parents did manage to rub off to them.

More traumas

The confusion surrounding the reform had one positive aspect though: in the panic of educators and parents, the PTAs throughout the island extended their arms to the schools in a desperate attempt to create, from the dust and cement, a school with a proper uniform, identity and philosophy, not based on insane and unhealthy competition against one another but a healthy one between one school and another.

It took time and hard work for the students of this generation to accept their uniform and start taking pride in it. Time to accept the lack of proper infrastructure, inadequate specialist rooms and the absence of basic scientific and ICT equipment. Time to begin to forget their traumas as a generation of guinea pigs. As parents of the guinea pigs, we had just about started to relax and hope for some improvement in infrastructure and equipment, and a much heavier investment in training and human resources when, the next thing we knew, this same generation of children is going again to be subjected to more emotional traumas through yet another change.... to go back to Form 1 to Form 6 schools?!!! ?Nous considerons, Mr Gokhool tells us, ?entre autres, que l?enfant doit avoir un développement harmonieux dans un système secondaire qui le mène dans le même collège de la Form I à la Form VI, avant d?entrer dans le monde du tertiaire.? (Week-End, 17th July).

We note with regret that, once again, the ?nous? does not include us parents, educators and stakeholders. Once again, it would seem, we will be dished out a formula to ?take it or leave it?. Once again, the same generation of children will be subjected to more emotional traumas.

We have, as a nation, voted for change, but we understood change to mean change for the better, not change for the sake of change. There are many improvements to be brought to the existing system without introducing any radical changes. We have, as a nation, put our trust in a new team.

Our expectations are that the new team trusts that we may, as parents and educators, have a notion of what is suitable for our children; that maybe we would like to be involved in whatever major change affects them; that maybe, just maybe, we are concerned about the future of our children and of our institutions.

Touria PRAYAG