RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

A week af­ter the prin­ci­pal stopped all on­line class­es for Forms 4, 5 and 6, par­ents of Bar­rack­pore West Sec­ondary School staged a so­cial­ly dis­tanced protest call­ing on the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion to in­ter­vene im­me­di­ate­ly.

In a memo is­sued on Oc­to­ber 12, prin­ci­pal Ed­ward Be­har­ry stat­ed on­line class­es will no longer be con­duct­ed and phys­i­cal class­es will be held for all stu­dents from Forms 4, 5 and 6.

But, Na­dia Aligour, Vice Pres­i­dent of the school's PTA said on­ly 80 per cent of 700 plus stu­dents have been vac­ci­nat­ed. 

This means the ma­jor­i­ty of stu­dents are at home, ex­pect­ing a con­tin­u­a­tion of on­line class­es, Aligour said.

She said while she un­der­stood the con­cerns of teach­ers that both on­line and phys­i­cal school can­not be ac­com­mo­dat­ed at the same time, Aligour called on school of­fi­cials and the Min­istry to work out a sched­ule that ac­com­mo­dates all stu­dents.

She not­ed that stu­dents who need­ed to do labs at school were in a quandary and could like­ly fail ex­ams if they are not al­lowed in school.

An­oth­er par­ent Mis­sy Re­narneaud said she had tak­en a de­ci­sion not to get her son vac­ci­nat­ed as he had health com­pli­ca­tions as a child. She said she had al­ready lost one fam­i­ly mem­ber in Trinidad who was par­tial­ly vac­ci­nat­ed and two oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers from the Unit­ed States who were ful­ly vac­ci­nat­ed.

Re­narneaud said the Min­istry had erred by not al­low­ing un­vac­ci­nat­ed stu­dents in schools.

A for­mer teacher and com­mu­ni­ty ac­tivist Ed­ward Mood­ie al­so slammed in­ter­net ser­vice providers for not fa­cil­i­tat­ing stu­dents. He said it was not pos­si­ble to live stream from the school as con­nec­tiv­i­ty was poor. 

Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly has pub­licly said that on­line class­es have not been stopped by the Min­istry. She said the onus was on prin­ci­pals to work out a timetable with their teach­ers and en­sure that all stu­dents are ac­com­mo­dat­ed. Guardian Me­dia will bring you more as this sto­ry un­folds.