QC PTA prioritises staff recruitment, rebuilding -department heads vacancies still open Stabroek News October 22, 1999 The rebuilding of Queen's College (QC) and recruiting and retaining qualified teachers will continue to be the priorities of its Parent Teachers' Association (PTA). This was the pledge of Principal Magistrate Juliet Holder-Allen who was returned as president of the QCPTA at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the association held at the National Cultural Centre on Tuesday evening. Delivering the President's address, Holder-Allen invited parents to comment on the new designs for the rebuilding of offices, specialty classrooms and other facilities which were destroyed by fire in November 1997. She said that since the QC Board of Governors unveiled the designs done by a foreign company two weeks ago, a number of parents had expressed dissatisfaction with them. The cost for rebuilding the new facilities, which is designed in a campus-style, is estimated at $400 million. She noted that part of the cost of the rebuilding of the school will be included in next year's budgetary allocations while the remainder will be gleaned from extra-budgetary resources. Holder-Allen said it was obvious, following a meeting she had held with teachers of the school, that they were not satisfied with their terms and conditions of employment. She said that there was a suggestion from the parent body that the school's PTA meet the cost of bringing the teachers' salaries in line with the 25% to 40% increases recommended by the Guyana Teachers' Union (GTU) to the tribunal which dealt with increases in teachers' salaries recently. While many parents supported this suggestion there were some who did not. However, she said that the tribunal's award of a 12% increase on teachers' salaries was not enough to stem the tide of resignations within the system and in her opinion, only made things worse. To date, she said there had been many resignations by experienced teachers. The remaining teachers, she said, have conveyed to the PTA that they were not interested in any scheme that would allow parents to dictate to them how to carry out their teaching duties. It was indeed unfortunate, she said, that the good intentions of some parents were being undermined by the careless remarks of others. At the moment, Holder-Allen said, the recommendation has been referred to a select committee which is considering it. In the meantime, she urged that those parents, "who do not support the scheme, not to make any negative comments about it, but simply to exercise their options not to participate in it if they are so inclined." Meanwhile in her presentation, Principal Wendel Roberts noted that the school has vacancies for heads of department for Home Economics, Agricultural Science, Industrial Arts, Science, Modern Languages and Business. The school also needs a graduate teacher each for Biology, Chemistry, Physics, French; a full-time graduate teacher each for French, Geography and for the Allied Arts. (Miranda La Rose) A © page from: Guyana: Land of Six Peoples