An 11-year-old boy of Angoy’s Avenue, New Amsterdam was picked up by the Department of Education in Region Six last Wednesday after he stayed home from school to care for his three-year-old brother.

He was among 130 school-aged children between the ages of six and 15 who were picked up by the Department of Education in Region Six during a sweep in Angoy’s Avenue and surrounding communities.

The exercise was part of the Operation Care Campaign which got underway two weeks ago to ensure that children are not denied an education. Schools’ Welfare Officer Alfa Mohamed told Stabroek News that the campaign was ongoing.

The boy’s mother had left to go to the shop and he stayed at home to take care of his sibling; his father was out as well.

The three-year-old refused to stay with the neighbours to allow his brother to go with the welfare officers to a “holding centre.” Eventually he was taken along with his brother.

Other children who were picked up were also taken to the centre and parents were asked to go and sign and take them home. When they showed up the parents were also counselled about the importance of sending their children to school.

In another unsettling scenario, a 10-year-old who was picked up at a shop told the officers that he had gone to purchase cigarettes for his father. The excuse the father gave for the child’s absence from school was that his hair had to be cut.

Some of the residents cooperated with the officers and even directed them to where other children who did not attend school lived.

Others meanwhile, lamented that the move by the ministry was unfair because many of the children do not get anything to eat to go to school.

One woman argued that her neighbours’ child who was being taken away lives with his single mother who has to care for 11 children.

She said that the ministry should put feeding programmes in place for the children and that the Ministry of Human Services and Social Security should start registering the children for public assistance which they had applied for but have been unsuccessful in obtaining.

She said after the children start benefiting from those services then the Ministry of Education can carry on the truancy campaigns as parents will have no excuse for keeping children at home.

Angoy’s Avenue is a typical urban slum with its high prevalence of poverty, underdevelopment, and single parent families [mostly mothers] as well as overcrowded homes. It was found that many of the school-aged children did not attend school because of these circumstances.

Nevertheless Mohamed encouraged parents to send their children to school especially those who have completed the recent National Grade Six Assessment.