ATTEMPTS to find a reasonable solution to the 2015 promotion list for teachers have collapsed, leaving the Guyana Teachers Union (GTU) to take the matter before the courts after the Teaching Service Commission (TSC) and the union failed yesterday to reach a compromise.In early July, the GTU filed an injunction against the TSC objecting to the publication of the final list of teachers promoted in 2015.

The injunction was granted by Chief Justice (ag) Ian Chang, preventing the TSC from issuing and publishing promotions for 2015. The matter was brought to the High Court by Attorney-at-law Roysdale Forde who is representing the GTU.

NO CONFIDENCE
The union felt that the TSC had strayed from its rules and regulations in the way it processed promotions.
However, subsequent to a meeting between President of the GTU Mark Lyte and Chairman of the TSC Leila Ramson, yesterday, Lyte said the union now has no confidence in the commission or its chairperson.

“We were trying to see if the matter could have been resolved outside of the court, so we have had a few meetings with the Minister of Education and his advisers pertaining to the way forward. The minister and his team were serving as mediators to the TSC. They were trying to provide a level playing field so we could have interacted through one representative from the TSC, when that did not work we were asked to meet with the TSC,” Lyte explained.

The union met yesterday with Chairperson Ramson and Deputy Chairperson Allan Munroe, but according to the GTU President, unfortunately nothing came out of the meeting.

“It was requested by the union for us to have a complete review of all the applications made; the TSC seems to be willing to look at specific ones and we are saying that there is enough time, since the process takes about two months, having received all the various applications from the various regions,” he said.

“Most of the work is almost finished, since they have all the spreadsheets and all the applications and everything, so it’s just a matter of pulling them and going through.”

Noting that the commission is reluctant to pursue this approach, Lyte said the TSC chairperson indicated that her commissioners are not prepared to do so “at this point and time,” so there was no agreement made between the two bodies and the court will have to make the decision.

NO DUE PROCESS
Pointing out that the GTU has enough evidence to prove that many eligible teachers were not promoted for various reasons, Lyte said it is the union’s belief that due process was not followed.

According to him, the commission has been making decisions on the basis of “comments” penned by respective Regional Education Officers (REDO) and officials at the Education Ministry on the application forms when teachers apply for promotion.

Although some teachers may have scored the highest possible points, they were refused promotion because of reports from regional officers or head teachers that they needed more supervision, while persons with fewer points were promoted instead.

“The TSC receives the form from the central ministry and acts on just the comments instead of the points, which is an accumulation of the years of experience and qualifications of a teacher. So the TSC basically deviated from the rules,” the GTU President declared.

“Our position is that all the applications received by the TSC and the school board secretariat should be reviewed and we believe they have enough time to review them in time for the teachers to be promoted in January, since the process takes two months,” Lyte noted.
He further observed that if the TSC commissioners are tired, the relevant authorities or President David Granger should appoint a new commission “that has the energy and vigour to review the matter and cases, [because] based on what came out we don’t have confidence in the present commission.”