Sascha Wil­son

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly says there is no pol­i­cy bar­ring chil­dren from wear­ing cloth­ing oth­er than their school uni­form to at­tend func­tions at their schools.

The min­is­ter told Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day that she is now in­ves­ti­gat­ing and has asked for a re­port re­gard­ing a memo that was sent to the prin­ci­pal of the Pe­nal Rock Pres­by­ter­ian School that re­sult­ed in the stu­dents be­ing un­able to wear East In­di­an at­tire on the eve of Di­vali on Wednes­day.

Guardian Me­dia re­port­ed on the sto­ry on Wednes­day, af­ter ob­tain­ing a copy of the cir­cu­lar pur­port­ed­ly sent by a school su­per­vi­sor 1 to the school’s prin­ci­pal.

The memo in­formed the prin­ci­pal of a pol­i­cy that stu­dents could not wear tra­di­tion­al ap­par­el to school and would, there­fore, have to re­port in their uni­forms and then change over dur­ing the course of the school day. The prin­ci­pal ex­pressed con­cern about this process and, as a re­sult, opt­ed to can­cel the idea.

This up­set par­ents, some of whom had pur­chased In­di­an wear for their chil­dren for the oc­ca­sion.

How­ev­er, com­ment­ing on the de­ci­sion via What­sApp yes­ter­day, Gads­by-Dol­ly said prin­ci­pals have the au­thor­i­ty to au­tho­rise vari­a­tions to the school uni­form for school ac­tiv­i­ties, and this has been the prac­tice.

She added, “No of­fi­cial of the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion, in­clud­ing the Per­ma­nent Sec­re­tary, the Chief Ed­u­ca­tion Of­fi­cer, and the Di­rec­tor of School Su­per­vi­sion, have iden­ti­fied any pol­i­cy, of­fi­cial or un­writ­ten—which re­stricts vari­a­tion of the school uni­form by prin­ci­pals for school ac­tiv­i­ties, and none which spec­i­fies that stu­dents can on­ly change out of uni­form while on the school com­pound.”

The min­is­ter said prin­ci­pals’ au­thor­i­ty to vary the school uni­form for school ac­tiv­i­ties will now be re­it­er­at­ed via cir­cu­lar mem­o­ran­dum to all su­per­vi­sors and prin­ci­pals.

Fol­low­ing the Guardian Me­dia ar­ti­cle high­light­ing the is­sue and the par­ents’ dis­gust with the de­ci­sion, the Pres­by­ter­ian Pri­ma­ry Schools’ Board of Ed­u­ca­tion al­so is­sued a re­lease yes­ter­day, mak­ing it clear they had no ob­jec­tion to stu­dents and teach­ers of its 72 pri­ma­ry schools wear­ing East In­di­an at­tire to mark Di­vali cel­e­bra­tions.

The board said neg­a­tive com­ments on so­cial me­dia blam­ing the Pres­by­ter­ian Church of Trinidad and To­ba­go and the board were not based on facts but con­jec­ture and false in­for­ma­tion.

“The fact is that the prin­ci­pal’s ac­tions were based on a writ­ten di­rec­tive to her and oth­er prin­ci­pals in the Ed­u­ca­tion Dis­trict. The board ful­ly un­der­stands the angst of par­ents in all our schools who are up­set that their chil­dren did not get the op­por­tu­ni­ty to cel­e­brate Di­vali at school in their tra­di­tion­al East In­di­an wear.”

The board ex­pressed con­cern that the guid­ance and ad­vice giv­en to prin­ci­pals by Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion of­fi­cials across Ed­u­ca­tion Dis­tricts were di­verse and not con­sis­tent and called on the min­istry to is­sue clear writ­ten guide­lines to all prin­ci­pals on this mat­ter.

Not­ing that pri­ma­ry schools do not have change rooms, the board stat­ed that hav­ing chil­dren change their clothes in school would be chal­leng­ing to man­age, bear­ing in mind the con­di­tions of some wash­rooms.

The board added that stu­dents’ pri­va­cy and stor­age of uni­forms, shoes and oth­er is­sues should al­so be con­sid­ered.

The board added that it is will­ing to work with all stake­hold­ers to find a process that would en­sure stu­dents’ safe­ty, while al­low­ing them to en­gage in ac­tiv­i­ties that in­volve wear­ing cloth­ing oth­er than their school uni­forms.