Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior Re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

T&T Uni­fied Teach­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) pres­i­dent Mar­tin Lum Kin is con­cerned that the re-in­tro­duc­tion of the lap­top pro­gramme by the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress-led Gov­ern­ment could lead to mis­use and what he called aca­d­e­m­ic dis­hon­esty.

On Thurs­day, Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath an­nounced that 18,000 de­vices were be­ing pro­cured for Form One stu­dents for the new aca­d­e­m­ic year start­ing in Sep­tem­ber.

Yes­ter­day, Lum Kin, wel­comed the move but cau­tioned that prop­er safe­guards must ac­com­pa­ny the ini­tia­tive.

Lum Kin said with­out ad­e­quate reg­u­la­tion, there could be “cheat­ing.”

“This area of hon­esty and in­tegri­ty has to be in­grained in stu­dents at an ear­ly age. If they see that hard work and not by cheat­ing, they can get ahead, and it is the cor­rect way, then you will be able to utilise these pro­grams. It won’t be one hun­dred per cent fool­proof, but some­thing we have to look at.”

The lap­top dis­tri­b­u­tion was ini­tial­ly im­ple­ment­ed by the UNC ad­min­is­tra­tion in 2010. How­ev­er, when the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment took of­fice, a means test was in­tro­duced to en­sure that on­ly stu­dents who need­ed a lap­top re­ceived one.

Lum Kin al­so em­pha­sised the need for com­pre­hen­sive sup­port sys­tems, in­clud­ing re­li­able in­ter­net ac­cess and dig­i­tal train­ing for both teach­ers and stu­dents.

“The providers of ed­u­ca­tion to our stu­dents should al­so be up to date with the de­vices, with the soft­ware and apps that will as­sist them. We are look­ing for­ward to see­ing de­vices like smart boards and oth­er con­nec­tiv­i­ty de­vices that will as­sist the teach­ers,” Lum Kin.

Mean­while, IT con­sul­tant Shiv­am Teelucks­ingh al­so not­ed the need for strict mon­i­tor­ing mea­sures for the de­vices. 

“A pop­u­lar game, Roblox, for ex­am­ple, you could lit­er­al­ly join cha­t­rooms with­out ma­jor re­stric­tions, and these kids are talk­ing to strangers and these strangers are ask­ing names. There were a cou­ple of cas­es brought to my at­ten­tion where they were ask­ing to meet up, lo­cal per­sons, mind you.

“Ask­ing 15-year-olds and 13-year-olds to meet up, what they are do­ing, and where they are from. It is easy to ma­nip­u­late some of these kids.”

When con­tact­ed yes­ter­day, Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dowlath said care­ful con­sid­er­a­tion was be­ing giv­en to the op­tions of both hard­ware and soft­ware avail­able.