I would like to endorse the sentiments expressed by Mr. Peters in last Tuesday’s letters column and to congratulate the Saraswat Vidya Niketan(SVN) for its splendid effort in delivering quality education to the children in Guyana.
I would particularly like to comment on his position on extra lessons-a stand which I am on record in supporting nearly 50 years ago as a young teacher at Zeeburg Secondary. I believed then and still do that if a child cannot learn in five hours he would not be able to learn in eight or nine hours.
I have seen firsthand the nefarious and immoral practices of head teachers and their underlings, depriving their students access to quality education during the day so that they can attend their afternoon classes at considerable expense to their parents. I have railed against this practice, both as a teacher and as an administrator at the Ministry of Education.I served as The Assistant Chief Education Officer for Secondary Education among other positions, but I was rebuffed by the cultural acceptance of this dastardly practice that prevailed at the time, including one of the chief culprits of the practice who served as Deputy Chairman of the Teaching Service Commission. Generations of young people have had their childhoods destroyed by greedy perpetrators of “lesson factories” and I think that the time has come for the government to put an end to this money-grabbing enterprise. Incidentally, the Swami is a personal friend and classmate of mine.