Part 2
The Minister of Education has gone on record as expressing a suspicion that there was bias in the award of scholarships under the People's Partnership Government. Former Education Minister Tim Gopeesingh had called him out on it and demanded an apology.
Mr Garcia failed to reveal any supporting statistics, while Dr Rowley blindly supported this allegation by simply suggesting that if such a view was expressed by a minister in his Cabinet, he (Dr Rowley) would have good reason to think that the minister knows what he is talking about.
Pressed further, Dr Rowley did express some suspicions of his own. "What I'm aware of is that the evaluation frameworks for the development of scholarships were shaped in such a way that the scoring was weighted in favour of medical and legal applicants over other categories."
According to the T&T Guardian of January 21: "While there has been no Government decision 'at this stage' to cut the number of scholarships awarded to T&T nationals pursuing tertiary level studies, the 'level of generosity that existed before' may not be prevailing due to T&T's stringent circumstances, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley has warned."
Generosity, Dr Rowley? Not meritocracy?
I trust that this is not an indulgence in racist or socio-political dog-whistling whereby coded phrases are used in such a way so that those who are meant to understand are the ones that do, whilst others never know what transpired. Words like "bias" "generosity" "weighted in favour of..." etc, all seem to suggest that the scholarship system is not one based on meritocracy.
If indeed there is bias, we as a country need to know. But simply spouting off opinions and suspicions without basis is downright unacceptable. People in authority can ill-afford to create for themselves a reputation of irresponsibility and prejudice.
For example, in 2014, Dr Rowley expressed alarm that there was an increase in the number of scholarships, and was disturbed that the scholarship list was provided by CXC to the Ministry of Education in August and only released as late as October. He demanded an explanation, as this tardiness raised suspicions about transparency, bias and accountability.
This position was also put forward by the then candidate for La Horquetta/Talparo, Maxie Cuffie. However, the Ministry of Education made it clear that this was frankly not so.
According to the Newsday of October 21, 2014: "The merged databases were received from CXC on September 15, 2014 and the standard scores on October 7, 2014, following which the list of scholarships was finalized by the Scholarship Committee and promptly released on October 9, 2014." Newsday also contacted Davanand Sinanan, president of the Trinidad and Tobago Unified Teachers' Association (TTUTA). Sinanan said TTUTA has not heard of any complaints about the scholarships with the exception of the Cuffie article.
As far back as 2002, Dr Rowley had raised issues about the need to help at-risk black youths and the need for remedial programmes. Colm Imbert was in support of this and suggested that there is a need to establish programmes at COSTAATT to help those in the 17-24 age bracket.
Indeed this was a laudable goal, and even today, all at-risk youth of any ethnicity, should be given assistance. However, the difficulty lies in the wholly unacceptable idea that one group must succeed at the expense of the other.
It is easy to go away with the impression that the Minister of Education, ably supported by the Prime Minister, is playing see-saw, pushing one down and expecting the other will rise.
It is frightening to think that a minister in charge of all the vulnerable school-aged section of the population can attempt to tinker with the system to ensure that one group be handicapped in the belief that this will address the problems of the other groups.
Perhaps the minister will be well-advised to consider taking an example from the denominational schools themselves, in which success is premised on sheer hard work, parental involvement and prayer.
Outgoing TTUTA president, Devanand Sinanan has repeatedly called for a removal of the Concordat, insisting that it is inimical to our country. One wonders if the gentleman even listens to himself.
The Concordat governs all denominational schools, and these are the schools that have produced academically-excelling students. I wish to ask Mr Sinanan when last did he see students from such schools appearing on national television jostling teachers or police officers? Success should not be punished. You don't make everyone equal by saying...'Aha there's inequity in our health system between smokers and non-smokers; therefore everyone should smoke!'
This idea of equalizing the playing field should never come at the expense of downgrading a system that works just for the sake of equity with those that do not.
Mr Sinanan should realise that the answer is to bring the under-performing and under-achieving state-run schools on par with the denominational schools that excel, regardless of how scornful he feels towards them. In a country striving for first-world status, academic excellence is non-negotiable!