Sto­ries by Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

The Prime Min­is­ter must state a proac­tive re­form-based pol­i­cy on po­lice of­fi­cers in schools, go to work on re­al so­lu­tions to re­duce school vi­o­lence and stop the rant­i­ng, says Op­po­si­tion Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment leader Pen­ny Beck­les.

Beck­les made the com­ment on X and on Face­book on Sun­day night.

This, af­ter Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s state­ment telling par­ents not to wor­ry and that T&T Po­lice Ser­vice of­fi­cers will re­main in schools to pro­tect chil­dren, de­spite what the PM said was the “un­der­min­ing of the pro­gramme by PNM MPs.”

Ad­dress­ing the pro­gramme, how­ev­er, Beck­les called on the PM to “re­new Stu­dent Sup­port Staff con­tracts, restart youth pro­grammes, stop ma­jor­ing in ‘plas­ters’ to cov­er deep wounds.”

“The PNM laid the foun­da­tion—for God’s sake build on it and stop the rant­i­ng! The Prime Min­is­ter must clear­ly state a proac­tive, re­form-based pol­i­cy on po­lice of­fi­cers in schools, be open to in­no­v­a­tive so­lu­tions for ed­u­ca­tion, and stop ma­jor­ing in po­lit­i­cal gim­micks,” Beck­les said.

“This Band-Aid ap­proach to school vi­o­lence isn’t a long-term so­lu­tion. Our na­tion’s youth need re­al in­ter­ven­tion, in­no­va­tion and strong pro­grammes that guide them away from a life of crime.”

Beck­les cit­ed the School of Fo­cus ini­tia­tive un­der for­mer PNM Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly, which sup­port­ed stu­dents by ad­dress­ing their lived re­al­i­ties.

“These are the pro­grammes that must be ex­pand­ed. Po­lice in schools, with­out a prop­er re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion frame­work, is a failed ap­proach,” she said.

“We need peer con­flict res­o­lu­tion, men­tal health sup­port, teacher re­sources, struc­tured rein­te­gra­tion in­to class­rooms, and mean­ing­ful cur­ricu­lum re­form. But what is clear is the Prime Min­is­ter’s fix­a­tion on pun­ish­ment over so­lu­tions.

“At the same time, thou­sands of stu­dents who re­lied on tech­ni­cal and vo­ca­tion­al train­ing have gone 11 months with­out a pro­gramme, while the CCC (Civil­ian Con­ser­va­tion Corps) re­mains closed.”

She added, “Par­ents are in­creas­ing­ly con­cerned that schools are be­com­ing re­stric­tive en­vi­ron­ments where chil­dren feel un­able to ex­press them­selves, places that re­sem­ble de­ten­tion rather than de­vel­op­ment.”

Beck­les point­ed out that a po­lice of­fi­cer is not a guid­ance coun­sel­lor.

“We’ve asked whether this pro­gramme would mir­ror the Po­lice Youth Club mod­el, yet no an­swers have been pro­vid­ed. While the Prime Min­is­ter re­mains out of touch, our youth need sup­port, en­gage­ment, and lead­er­ship. She can­not point to mean­ing­ful en­gage­ment with cit­i­zens over the past decade,” Beck­les said.

“The is­sue isn’t sim­ply po­lice in schools, but the ab­sence of a co­her­ent pol­i­cy to de­vel­op our chil­dren and steer them away from crime. In­stead, while at­ten­tion is di­vert­ed to­ward the PNM, crit­i­cal mat­ters such as in­te­grat­ing AI in­to ed­u­ca­tion and stu­dent as­sess­ment re­main ne­glect­ed.

“T&T, this Gov­ern­ment has no vi­sion and con­tin­ues to re­ly on vaps and politricks.”