Dear Editor,

According to data from the Ministry of Education, fewer than 20 per cent of grade 11 students successfully achieve passing grades in five Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) subjects, including math and English. The problems plaguing education appear insurmountable, but they can be corrected with appropriate solutions.

A quality education system requires competent teachers who are motivated to improve their performance. Say what you want about class sizes, but teacher-quality is the most important in-school factor for a student’s success.

A few years ago, Tennessee’s Department of Education launched the STAR project to evaluate the effects of smaller class sizes on student achievement over a four-year period, the study identified a correlation between student achievement and smaller classes. However, deeper analysis indicated that differences in student performance were more heavily influenced by the teacher than by student ethnicity, income group or by the school attended by the student.

Academic superpowers like Finland and South Korea understand the importance of recruiting effective teachers and upgrading their skills. For example, in 2010, 6,600 applicants competed for 660 primary school training slots in Finland. And, in South Korea, elementary teachers are selected from a dozen universities that admit only the top five per cent of applicants. In Singapore, only the top 30 per cent of high school graduates are accepted into the teaching profession.

Jamaica should adopt global standards and make the teaching profession more selective. If the profession becomes more selective, then a better crop of individuals will choose to become teachers. Prospective teachers only need five CSEC subjects to be accepted into a teaching programme. This number should be increased to eight and attaining subjects at the CAPE level must also be a requirement.

Furthermore, it would be appropriate for Jamaica to follow the examples of countries like Australia and Singapore and develop a professional body for teachers, with an emphasis on professional development and research. It is also quite interesting to note that teaching is collaborative in academic superpowers, with even senior teachers receiving mentors, and a greater level of autonomy exists.

As one commentator noted recently: “Finnish schools receive full autonomy, with head teachers experiencing considerable independence when developing their own individual curricula suited for their setting. Combinations of alternative pedagogic approaches, rather than mere instructional methods, are utilised by teachers. The pedagogical freedom experienced facilitates greater creativity, pro-activity and innovation.”

We should also deal with the issue of tenure and make it easier to dismiss ineffective teachers. Reforming education will be hard, but Jamaica’s survival depends on radical reforms.

Lipton Matthews

lo_matthews@yahoo.com