OPEN YOUR EYES STOP WASTING LIMITED RESOURCES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And the funny thing is all of us that have reached in the echelons of society forget how careless, lazy and uninterested in things but because someone gave us a chance. Why do you think first world countries continue to thrive? they encourage a culture of success right across the board. they try as best as possible to reduce the numbers of kids who drop out of school and even when you do drop out you are not cast away like they would adulterers in the biblical days … come on let’s get serious.

Many of us never took exams serious until it was time for external exams ….

You seem to think that students should be free to do what they want in schools. Removing suspension and expulsion- what then is the alternative. Firing teachers that get 50% passes. What about the students that consistently get 50% and below.

You seem to want to absolve students from any responsibilities.

Why should a student that shows no or little interest in a subject, who attendance is very poor and whos grade is very poor be sent up for CXC. If I was a teacher I would not recommend any students who is clearly not ready for CXC.

Suggest a viable alternative to moral guidance.

What do you think about using your time wisely, so you don’t have to be forced to study. Isn’t studying for your own good. Why should one be forced to.

Just my two cents.

So let’s really remove ourselves from this static position we are in when we hear of these things and face the damn reality. Thats why first world countries will forever be progressive … they face the harsh realities of time and they just roll with it… instead we talk about the stupid ole days when a parent from up the road could beat your child and he/she dare not tell u in the evening if he/she hopes to be spared from a second round!

How ridiculous! And let’s realise that we cant go back there … So time to move on into 2008.

Our problems are a multiplicity of factors and none of it will ever be dealt with if we continue to hide the truth from ourselves, fail to listen to those affected, take this top notch approach to bandaid everything … and – i wont continue to list all we have been doing wrong …

But seriously, school seems to be the hot topic for 2008 … textbooks removed a second time … condoms in school, school sex tapes, corporal punishment banned in schools at all levels, teachers and principals to get police training .. lol ..

what’s next on the list of things to do for schools?

hmmm .. let’s see .. how about:
1) proper human resource strategies to motivate teachers (esp. the ones who just in the job to get a salary)
2) remove suspension and expulsion
3) remove teachers who continue year on year off to have even 50% passses
4) change the old guidance counsellors – who are guiding us on the sole basis of morals
5) allow all students take every subject at high school – its not the teachers decision to decide who is ready for cxc (at least thats our excuse) – stop protecting school image
6) introduce alternative learning in schools – skills, dj, music mixing, graphic design, cosmo, etc
7) compulsory after school hours for studying
performing arts programme in all schools
9) pump money into schools sports programmes

Now thats something worthwhile doing.

Based on my reading of the news, what has changed is the frequency and the tone of the reportage; violence in schools adds a lovely flavor to the melodrama and overt sensationalism of crime coverage, thus ratcheting up the stress level and sense of victimization on the part of the teachers.

The teachers themselves have also become more verbally abusive and antagonistic towards students, and disrespectful to the parents, both out of frustration as well as blatant disregard for people’s feelings. So, there’s ill will on both sides.

But what is even more unconscionable is that the violence that has been going on in the schools for years, and which directly affects the students, has not prompted this kind of collective action on the part of the teachers until now. The JTA et al. have been all too content to malign the students and to use dubious terms like “lack of socialization” to attribute what is happening as the fault of the parents and family environment. I maintain that Jamaican teachers still don’t know how to relate to students beyond the doctrinaire and authoritarian approach of “I teach and you learn”. Challenging as the new school environment is, most teachers simply don’t have the education, skills or training to relate to children as children. Schools can’t be everything for children; family and school have to work together. I would love to find one, just one, example of a school that has taken on this concept wholesale and have tried to make it work.