RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Par­ents of pupils at the San Fer­nan­do Sev­enth-day Ad­ven­tist Pri­ma­ry School are call­ing for the Board and the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion to in­di­cate what will hap­pen to their stu­dents when they go back to school in the new term, as pro­posed school re­pairs have not even start­ed.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, PTA pres­i­dent Vaughn Joshua said the school was closed in Ju­ly and re­pairs were sup­posed to have com­menced over the hol­i­days at the school lo­cat­ed at Pouchet Street, San Fer­nan­do.

With two more weeks to go be­fore the new term, Joshua said no works have com­menced, and par­ents do not know when re­pairs will be­gin. Par­ents who have tried to get trans­fers for their chil­dren have al­so been un­suc­cess­ful, he added.

Joshua said the sit­u­a­tion stems from con­cerns over the struc­tur­al con­di­tion of the school, which was deemed a pro­hib­it­ed zone by the Oc­cu­pa­tion­al Safe­ty and Health Au­thor­i­ty (OS­HA), with de­mo­li­tion rec­om­mend­ed.

How­ev­er, Joshua said the South Caribbean Con­fer­ence of Sev­enth-day Ad­ven­tists de­cid­ed to chal­lenge that po­si­tion and un­der­take re­pairs to the school.

At a meet­ing with par­ents on Au­gust 4, he said the Con­fer­ence out­lined a pro­posed plan to be­gin re­pairs but par­ents were con­cerned that the re­pairs were be­ing pro­posed with­out writ­ten ap­proval or agree­ment from the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion, Min­istry of Works or OS­HA.

To date, Joshua said, no re­pairs have com­menced.

He not­ed that par­ents are al­so con­cerned about the ab­sence of a con­tin­gency plan for their chil­dren, par­tic­u­lar­ly as the new school term pro­gress­es.

Joshua said fam­i­lies were be­ing left in an un­cer­tain po­si­tion.

He not­ed that in Ju­ly the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion pro­posed to de­cant the school and send the stu­dents to three dif­fer­ent lo­ca­tions.

“We had al­ter­na­tive pro­pos­als but the Min­istry has not re­spond­ed,” he added.

He said the par­ents are now ask­ing the au­thor­i­ties and the school’s man­age­ment to pro­vide clar­i­ty on the way for­ward, par­tic­u­lar­ly re­gard­ing the safe­ty of the build­ing, the pro­posed re­pairs and the ed­u­ca­tion of the af­fect­ed chil­dren.

Joshua said their main con­cern is en­sur­ing that their chil­dren are able to con­tin­ue their ed­u­ca­tion in a safe en­vi­ron­ment.

Mean­while, for­mer par­ent Ken­naice Baird said the Min­istry was not be­ing trans­par­ent. He called for greater com­mu­ni­ca­tion among the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion, OS­HA, the Min­istry of Works and the South Caribbean Con­fer­ence of Sev­enth Day Ad­ven­tist, as well as an im­me­di­ate con­tin­gency arrange­ment for pupils while the dis­pute over the school build­ing is re­solved.

He said the stu­dents will most like­ly be home when school re­opens. “The con­struc­tion was sup­posed to take place over five weeks, but they have not giv­en us any­thing writ­ten, and we have no doc­u­ments, scope of works or the en­gi­neer’s find­ings,” he added.

Con­tact­ed for com­ment, Min­is­ter Dowlath said all arrange­ments are in place to ex­e­cute re­pairs, which will start soon. He said he will en­sure that the school re­opens in the new term.