Education Ministry sets aim to reduce achievement disparities
By Shirley Thomas
Guyana Chronicle
November 30, 2003
Minister of Education, Dr. Henry Jeffrey, has said that his Ministry will do everything within its power to reduce the disparities existing in the level of educational achievement between the people of the coastland and those in the hinterland of Guyana.
The Minister made this statement as he addressed a two-day seminar on Native Languages in Guyana at the Hotel Tower in Georgetown, yesterday.
Stressing that the Ministry of Education has an interest in helping the process forward to help children do better in schools, Minister Jeffrey urged that the education system work to support all processes to end this disparity in education.
The seminar, which brought together several representatives of Amerindian tribes with bilingual skills, supports the notion that nurturing and developing the languages spoken by the various indigenous tribes of Guyana is pivotal preserving Guyana's culture.
And Minister of Amerindian Affairs, Ms. Caroline Rodrigues, who spoke on "Perspectives on the Value and Use of Native Languages", stressed the importance of Language, as another aspect of one's culture which helps to helps improve esteem. She commended the current efforts by Government, at formalizing a policy on Native Language, Literacy and Bi-Lingual Education, noting that it was something to be embraced by all.
Other speakers on the programme which was intended to benefit mainly Amerindians from the hinterland locations of Guyana, were: Professor Dennis Craig of the University of Guyana who spoke on "Forms of Bilingual Education for Childhood Speakers of Indigenous Languages in Guyana"; Mr. Newton Profitt, Director of the Adult Education Association of Guyana who spoke on the programme being administered by his Association to promote the reading and writing of English - Guyana's mother language by the Wapishiana tribe in the Rupununi, and Head Master of Aishalton Secondary School, Mr. Adrian Gomes who reported on the "Wapishiana Language Programme in the South Rupununi."
Ms. Ramona Bennett: Winner of UG Vice Chancellor's Prize for Second Best Graduating Student (2003).
Mr. Profitt reported that as part of his agency's programme to promote bilingual skills in the Rupununi, AEA was already working with teachers and students - preparing booklets in Wapishana , depicting the history and culture of the tribe. In that Region too, the AEA, in collaboration with two Missionaries, in addition to compiling a dictionary of the Wapishana language, has also produced a grammar text in the use of Wapishana words. This was followed by other training courses for persons interested in learning the language.
Among the approximate thirty Amerindians teachers and other leaders assembled for the Seminar were representatives from the Wapishiana, Akawaio, Makushi, Patomonas and Lokona/Arawak tribes. Each of the indigenous groups brought greetings from their respective tribes.
Meanwhile, testimony to the success already achieved at 'reducing the disparities' or bridging the hinterland/coastland gap in education, was the presence of at least two young Amerindian graduates from leading international Universities in attendance at yesterday's seminar.
The graduates were: Forty year old Mr. Adrian Gomes, Head Master and Co-coordinator of the AEA Wapishana Linguistic programme. Mr. Gomes who hails from the village of Maruranau, recently returned home from a one year scholarship programme where he pursued his Master of Arts Degree in Language Teaching. The programme "Teaching English to speakers of other Languages" (with a slant in bilingual education) was made possible through a scholarship offered by the British High Commission in Guyana.
Describing the programme as a "very rewarding one", Gomes says he's now looking forward to seeing how it can be applied to help his Guyanese counterparts.
Mr. Adrian Gomes, recently secured a Master of Arts (M.A.) Degree in Language Teaching from Britain.
The other graduate Amerindian was 29 year old Ms. Ramona Bennett who hails from the Arawak village of Kabakaburi, Pomeroon River.
Ramona, who was named second best graduating student at the University of Guyana's recent Convocation Exercise, and copped the Vice Chancellor's medal, also graduated from Canada's York University last year, following a one year period of under-graduate studies there. She was one of two Guyanese scholars to have participated in a student exchange programme in Canada (2002-2003).
Ramona, now with a Bachelor's Degree in English (UG) is also a trained teacher, having graduated from the Cyril Potter College of Education (CPCE) in 1999. She is employed as a Language Teacher at the same institution.
With her heart's desire being - to be able to help the Amerindian people of Guyana especially academically, Ramona sees her job as a teacher at the Cyril Potter College of Education as having placed her in an ideal position so to do.