Dear Editor,
I am a young teacher – I started teaching just six years ago − but it feels as if I’ve been teaching for sixty years! I love teaching; I love children − that’s why I entered the profession. But I am sickened to my stomach at the moment. I am confused, tired, and afraid for the future of our tomorrows.

The Ministry of Education recently held a meeting with head teachers from the various schools across Region Six at the University of Guyana Tain Campus on the Corentyne. It was most unfortunate that the Minister did not meet directly with the people who have direct contact with the children of East Berbice. Then, he would have had to spend quite a few days in the region as I am sure he would have had tons and tons of comments from our teachers.

The meeting was about the ministry’s action plan for our education system. Note the term ‘action plan.’ Having a plan is good, but implementing it is another story. With the way things are going I go home on most days tired, worked out and discouraged not to go to work another day. And Editor, it’s not about the money. I know for a fact many other teachers share similar sentiments but nevertheless tire and labour for this profession.

If I’ve never been honest in any of my letters to the press over the past eight years, I am being very honest at this time.
My point for writing this letter is that I really would like to know, since the ministry has an “action plan,” its plans for Vryman’s Erven Secondary School and other schools across Guyana. I would be the happiest public servant if I could see something from this action plan put into action at the school where I teach, at least before I resign some time in the near future. How can the action plan address several concerns at this school?

We have several strangers entering the compound from all directions every single school day. We have past students, who have either been suspended or otherwise not attached any more to the school, returning to disrupt classroom teaching. Can the action plan address this concern? During the Diwali period, we had these same persons exploding firecrackers in the school building. Several were thrown into classrooms which had teachers teaching the nation’s children.

Does the action plan have anything to do with the children at my school who cannot read − period?
Furthermore, does it involve any solution for increasing the number of English Literature textbooks that I have to teach with from six textbooks for a class with nearly forty children? Also, can the students I teach even handle Shakespeare?

Earlier in this Christmas school term I had written a letter in these columns highlighting the furniture problem that plagues Vryman’s Erven Secondary School. A few days prior to the publication of the letter, we received about thirty pairs of combination iron chairs with desks − thirty! This amount, for a school with nearly five hundred children! Editor, shall I go on? Shall I vent my frustrations any further than this?  Then all the Ministry of Education keeps doing is coming down hard on teachers’ backs for getting this and that done. It is the tons upon tons of paperwork that has school managers busy and occupied and leaving the school plant unattended and in chaos! I am speaking the truth!
I believe, in all seriousness, that Vryman’s Erven Secondary School needs a new building. The current building is shaking and I think it will fall down one of these days. The patch work which is currently being undertaken on several portions of the building is just a temporary fix for a dire situation. We need some of those millions of dollars being spent on the education sector to construct a new school building.
I know our education system is strained − our government is under strain. But we had five hundred million dollars to spend on twelve days of Carifesta, so I think we can spend some money on our schools in East Berbice.

Yes, the focus on the bundles of paperwork and red tape is important, but it hinders the teacher from spending adequate time on what really matters − teaching people’s children! As I’ve repeatedly said, too much paperwork is being demanded of our teachers. Too much! Now the new thing is that teachers have to present their lesson plans to be vetted and signed before signing their time for work at every new working day.
Whichever genius came up with this one deserves an award! A lesson plan is the written guide of activities that would be used when teaching a lesson in a classroom situation. But I can have the best-prepared lesson plan in the whole wide world, and still stay away from my time-tabled class where that lesson plan would actually be worth its salt. How silly is this, Editor, that this new form of pressure is being imposed on teachers when it really doesn’t do anything to improve our deteriorating education system.
I feel so demotivated.

We educators need to get our priorities right in this country. We have to decide whether we’re going to constantly pressure teachers in the system or help them do their work better. We need to decide whether we’re going to have teachers write silly excuses for being one and two minutes late for work or focus on education delivery − which I believe is the crux of the matter. As a parent (if I were one), at the end of the day, I would like to know that my child was taught for a full two hundred and eighty minutes that day. I would like to see his or her book signed and dated and all necessary corrections made. I would like to see homework assignments given. Teachers have children going to other schools too, and they would not like the teachers there not to  teach their own children properly. They would like their children to receive quality education. They, too, would like value for their money in sending their own children to school.
There is also no drinking or running water at Vryman’s Erven Secondary School − absolutely none! This school needs urgent help − any!
Yours faithfully,
Leon Jameson Suseran

Editor’s note
We are sending a copy of this letter to Minister of Education Shaik Baksh for any comments he might wish to make.