SASCHA WIL­SON

Se­nior Re­porter

sascha.wil­son@guardian.co.tt

Par­ents of preschool­ers who have been out of school since last year af­ter the build­ing was re­port­ed­ly sold, are urg­ing the Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter to find an al­ter­na­tive lo­ca­tion for them as soon as pos­si­ble.

Par­ents told Guardian Me­dia that Fun­time EC­CE on New Colo­nial Road, Bar­rack­pore, was closed since the sec­ond week of the school term in Sep­tem­ber 2023.

One par­ent said, “The stu­dents had nor­mal school the first week of school and then on the Mon­day of the sec­ond week, the teach­ers were met with a pad­locked gate. The par­ents were told that school was closed for the day and then in an up­date from the school ad­min­is­tra­tor, that the chil­dren will have on­line class­es due to the sit­u­a­tion.”

The par­ents then learnt that the build­ing that housed the school for 16 years was sold. There were 45 stu­dents en­rolled and 15 more on the wait­ing list.

An­oth­er par­ent added that some par­ents did not have de­vices and/or prop­er in­ter­net or su­per­vi­sion for the chil­dren to do on­line class­es.

“We kept hear­ing that they found a new lo­ca­tion, they were wait­ing on pa­per­work, things are hap­pen­ing, but re­al­ly and tru­ly noth­ing is hap­pen­ing. Some of the stu­dents are still home.”

The par­ent said they re­ceived the first of­fi­cial cor­re­spon­dence from the min­istry signed by the Chief Ed­u­ca­tion Of­fi­cer in De­cem­ber.

It was then they were ad­vised that on­line class­es would be stopped on the last day of the school term and that arrange­ments were made for their chil­dren to be housed at three EC­CE schools in the area.

Not­ing that there was no con­sul­ta­tion with the par­ents, she said many par­ents are from the low­er to mid­dle-in­come brack­et and could not af­ford trav­el­ling costs, so they opt­ed not to send their chil­dren to those schools.

“Some of these chil­dren have ei­ther been home since Sep­tem­ber last year, some of them get the on­line school, some have not been able to and a lot of them are pupils who are prep­ping to go to pri­ma­ry school, so al­most two terms now they have been out of the school sys­tem, that is keep­ing them back,” she said.

When con­tact­ed via What­sApp Mes­sen­ger, Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly said they were work­ing with the Prop­er­ty and Re­al Es­tate Ser­vices Di­vi­sion (PRESD) of the Min­istry of Pub­lic Ad­min­is­tra­tion to se­cure a suit­able lo­ca­tion for the EC­CE school.

“As soon as it is avail­able, the par­ents will be ap­prised,” the min­is­ter promised.