In­tegri­ty Clubs to pro­mote in­tegri­ty and good gov­er­nance are be­ing in­tro­duced as a pi­lot project in six sec­ondary schools this week.

The project was launched yes­ter­day at Queen’s Roy­al Col­lege and at St George’s Col­lege last week Thurs­day by vice chair­man of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Trans­paren­cy In­sti­tute.

A sim­i­lar club will be launched at Spey­side Sec­ondary, To­ba­go, to­day.

In­tegri­ty Clubs, led by teach­ers and stu­dent lead­ers — “In­tegri­ty Am­bas­sadors” — will al­so be es­tab­lished at St Joseph’s Con­vent, San Fer­nan­do, Williamsville Sec­ondary and Bon Air Sec­ondary.

Dur­ing the re­cent school va­ca­tion, the “In­tegri­ty Am­bas­sadors”— a core group of teach­ers and stu­dent lead­ers at the six schools — at­tend­ed ori­en­ta­tion work­shops at St George’s Col­lege, Barataria.

The work­shop con­tin­ues at St George’s Col­lege, Barataria, on Sat­ur­day.

The for­mal launch of School In­tegri­ty Clubs project will take place at the Yara Au­di­to­ri­um, UWI-Arthur Lok Jack Glob­al School of Busi­ness on Fri­day at 9 am.

In­tegri­ty Clubs to cham­pi­on ac­count­abil­i­ty, com­pe­tence, ethics, and an­ti-cor­rup­tion be­hav­iour in the schools and com­mu­ni­ty are be­ing fa­cil­i­tat­ed by a steer­ing com­mit­tee which in­cludes rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the com­mis­sion, the Na­tion­al Par­ent-Teacher As­so­ci­a­tion and the lo­cal branch of Trans­paren­cy In­ter­na­tion­al.

The goals of the pi­lot project are to test and re­fine the In­tegri­ty Clubs be­fore wide­spread in­tro­duc­tion in­to all sec­ondary schools and to demon­strate the val­ue and ben­e­fit of the pro­gramme to stu­dents and teach­ers.

The In­tegri­ty Club Pi­lot Project is sup­port­ed by the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion and the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly’s Di­vi­sion of Ed­u­ca­tion.

In­tegri­ty Clubs seek to in­stil in­tegri­ty and eth­i­cal con­duct to counter some of the prob­lems and eth­i­cal chal­lenges be­ing ex­pe­ri­enced in our sec­ondary schools.

These chal­lenges in­clude: dis­re­spect for au­thor­i­ty, in­dis­ci­pline, bul­ly­ing, fight­ing, poor anger man­age­ment and con­flict res­o­lu­tion.

The clubs are de­signed to help in­stil in stu­dents and teach­ers the core val­ues of re­spect, fair­ness, com­pas­sion, in­tegri­ty, hon­esty and re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.

In­tegri­ty Clubs ex­ist in schools in Ja­maica, In­dia and in coun­tries on the African con­ti­nent.