Dear Editor,
The President declared that Spanish is now compulsory in public schools across Guyana, but are the required human resources and materials available to realise Dr Ali’s vision? Did Dr Ali analyse statistical information from the Ministry of Education (MoE) regarding the number of Spanish teachers in the school system before he made his proclamation; did he even consult with the ‘experts’ at that ministry?
Unfortunately, the cart was put before the horse, the reality on the ground is quite different from what the president envisions. Before declaring Spanish a compulsory subject in the school system, he should ensure that there are adequate resources presently available in the schools to realise his dream. Apart from the senior secondary schools in how many secondary schools across Guyana is Spanish offered at the moment? One cannot declare a subject compulsory without having adequate subject specialists, this is illogical. If you need to procure foreign Spanish-speaking teachers to meet the need then this should be done first. Also, is it guaranteed that the required number of foreign teachers would sign up to leave their homelands to work in public schools in Guyana? Even finding locals to fill the gap would be more difficult than the president believes. Just like how you simply cannot take a Guyanese (an English speaker) from off the street and place this person in a school to teach English, the same goes for the native ‘ordinary’ Spanish speaker teaching the Spanish Language because ‘creole’/street Spanish and English are different from what is taught in the classroom. Many Guyanese students even spend years in school learning the English Language and still fail the subject at CSEC.
While I am not familiar with staffing in the primary schools, at the secondary level it is utterly ridiculous to declare a subject compulsory yet just have one teacher assigned to a subject area; apart from being overburdened where is the contingency plan? I am sure that this is the situation in some secondary schools at the moment because this harebrained idea was sanctioned.
As expected, the MoE endorsed the President’s vision in a circular earlier this month and further elaborated on its expectations with the teaching of Spanish without conducting a proper assessment on the readiness of secondary schools to implement these measures. Who exactly provides teachers and materials, do they magically appear when the ones with power decree? Yet still, the MoE went on to issue another circular this month with the recommended maximum number of periods for different category of teachers to teach along with other measures for schools to implement ‘over the 2023-2024 academic year and beyond.’ Therefore, why should Spanish teachers in schools that are short-staffed in the modern languages dept. be burdened with teaching 13 and more classes, well over the maximum periods they should teach while their colleagues teach two or three classes? Is it fair to be constantly marking hundreds of assessments and are we allowed to refer to Circular No: 7/2023?
An excellent start to realising Dr Ali’s vision on Spanish being compulsory would be for the MoE to ensure that each secondary school has at least two Spanish teachers, Spanish textbooks for both teachers and students (at the very least a class set for each level) and ideally a Modern Languages room so that students can engage in activities such as singing, skits, listening to Spanish music and possibly viewing educational videos on the Spanish Language if the MoE can stump up for a smart TV. Resources are needed for dreams to be realised.
Presently, another Spanish teacher is needed at Annandale Secondary School, having just one teacher teaching a particular subject in a secondary school is insufficient. Also, a class set of Spanish textbooks (preferably the Dime Series) is needed for the different levels. Since Spanish is not a core subject just one hour per week is allocated for it, having to write all notes including dialogues on the chalkboard is not only time consuming but the students are unable to see the beautiful illustrations in these books. Also, more cupboards are needed for teachers. Since I’ve been at this school, I’ve never had access to a shelf in a cupboard to store work materials. And there is no internet access for teachers, this has been the situation for years regardless of whether the school has internet or not.
Editor, dreams cannot be realised overnight with mere words, resources are needed. The MoE should know this and act sensibly with the implementation of its grand plan.
Regards,
Narissa Deokarran
