It is in­con­ceiv­able that the Caribbean Ex­am­i­na­tions Coun­cil (CXC) is plan­ning to elim­i­nate from its cur­ricu­lum pre-cur­sor sub­jects in elec­tri­cal, elec­tron­ic tech­nol­o­gy en­gi­neer­ing and agri­cul­ture with­out ap­par­ent good cause. At best, it seems an at­tempt by the re­gion­al ex­am­i­na­tion body, re­spon­si­ble for de­vel­op­ing cur­ricu­lum and set­ting tests, to have gov­ern­ments of the re­gion make in­creased con­tri­bu­tions to con­tin­ue with the sub­jects in the Caribbean Sec­ondary Ed­u­ca­tion Cer­tifi­cate (CSEC) and Caribbean Ad­vanced Pro­fi­cien­cy Ex­am (CAPE) lev­els.

It is dis­con­cert­ing that the CXC should even con­tem­plate the pos­si­bil­i­ty of the sub­jects be­ing dropped. How­ev­er, it’s re­as­sur­ing that thought is be­ing giv­en to the CXC’s propo­si­tion that in­creased pay­ments be made to con­tin­ue the sub­jects.

The tech­ni­cal and sci­en­tif­ic na­ture of the sub­ject ar­eas are vi­tal­ly con­nect­ed to the prepa­ra­tion of young peo­ple for ca­reers in these ar­eas of na­tion build­ing; both in terms of the phys­i­cal ac­qui­si­tion and lo­cal­i­sa­tion of tech­nol­o­gy and for greater eco­nom­ic ac­tiv­i­ty in food pro­duc­tion.

It would be an act of re­gion­al and na­tion­al sui­cide if the two par­ties, the Caribbean gov­ern­ments and the CXC, were to be se­ri­ous­ly con­sid­er­ing the cur­tail­ment of in­duc­tion and learn­ing across the iden­ti­fied ar­eas. If that were al­lowed, it would ef­fec­tive­ly place T&T and the re­gion in an un­com­pet­i­tive po­si­tion with the rest of the world.

To have a de­creased num­ber of stu­dents get­ting an ear­ly in­duc­tion in­to the fields of en­gi­neer­ing, tech­nol­o­gy and agri­cul­ture, may rob them of the op­por­tu­ni­ty to con­ceive of ca­reers in these vi­tal ar­eas of study.

The hope, there­fore, must be that the CXC, pre­sum­ably re­quir­ing ad­di­tion­al funds to con­tin­ue teach­ing tech­ni­cal sub­jects ef­fec­tive­ly, will ne­go­ti­ate for a pos­i­tive end for all.

Guardian Me­dia makes the pre­sump­tion that CXC has made some­thing of a full propo­si­tion to the re­gion­al gov­ern­ments re­gard­ing the con­tin­ued teach­ing of the tech­ni­cal sub­jects to stu­dents.

There sure­ly will be the need for such a propo­si­tion from the CXC to al­low min­istries of ed­u­ca­tion and Cari­com mem­ber coun­tries to deeply con­tem­plate the ab­solute need for the ex­ist­ing cur­ricu­lum to be con­tin­ued.

Once up­on a time, the po­si­tion of the T&T Gov­ern­ment re­gard­ing pro­vid­ing sec­ondary school places for all the chil­dren who sat the then Com­mon En­trance Ex­am, was that it could not af­ford to find places for all of the 11 and 12-year-olds who sat the en­try ex­am. So too was there an in­suf­fi­cien­cy of places for chil­dren to do tech-voc pro­grammes.

So­ci­ety con­tin­ues to pay the price for young boys and girls out of school and with­out skills, who, in many in­stances, suc­cumb to what is sold to them by the crim­i­nal el­e­ment as the next best op­tion to earn a liv­ing and to place mon­ey in their pock­ets to spend.

As we feel and wit­ness every day, large num­bers of young peo­ple, who con­tin­ue to be left with­out skills and le­gal op­tions, are not on­ly killing each oth­er in fights over turf but are rob­bing in­no­cent cit­i­zens of their prop­er­ty and tak­ing their lives. The Gov­ern­ment and all in­volved must en­sure the con­tin­u­a­tion of the tech­ni­cal cur­ricu­lum; it’s where the fu­ture lies.