Ms Hy­acinth Guy's in­ter­view with re­porter Clevon Raphael in the Guardian (April 29, 2012) ti­tled, "We don't take in­struc­tions from politi­cians–TSC head" had me in to­tal shock. As for­mer teacher my­self, I can ap­pre­ci­ate the ut­ter chaos at present with­in the ed­u­ca­tion­al sys­tem.

To me, Ms Guy's com­ments seem self-serv­ing and I dare­say sound like an at­tempt to un­der­mine the present Gov­ern­ment. As chair­man of the Teach­ing Ser­vice com­mis­sion (TSC) I deem Ms Guy's com­ments ir­re­spon­si­ble. In­stead of work­ing to­geth­er with the Gov­ern­ment for the greater good of our na­tion, she chose to make com­ments about the TSC man­date be­ing to in­su­late teach­ers from politi­cians.

She elab­o­rat­ed by out­lin­ing about the role and func­tion of the TSC, some­thing that I am pos­i­tive the gen­er­al pop­u­la­tion al­ready knew; her com­ments dur­ing that in­ter­view were noth­ing new to us. Ms Guy seems some­what con­fused, as she said, "the func­tion of the TSC is to act as an in­de­pen­dent body."

What is the func­tion­ing then, be­ing in­de­pen­dent, in the con­text of the na­tion­al pol­i­cy agen­da for ed­u­ca­tion? From the tone of the in­ter­view, it seems to me that Ms Guy want­ed to stress on the TSC be­ing sep­a­rate and apart from the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion.

How will this au­gur in the in­ter­est of the pop­u­la­tion Ms Guy? Your at­ti­tude seems self­ish. The chil­dren of the na­tion will have to pay the ul­ti­mate price with the work of the TSC be­ing left un­done. Ms Guy, please, in­stead of plac­ing your fo­cus on crit­i­cis­ing Dr Gopeesingh in the na­tion­al press, you should fo­cus on fill­ing the 300-plus va­can­cies in the Teach­ing Ser­vice. I im­plore that you change your at­ti­tude in the in­ter­est of the chil­dren who are the fu­ture of the na­tion.

Lenore Jug­mo­han

Via e-mail