THE month of September is designated Education Month. The theme for this year is, ‘Education for all: Innovative teaching and learning in a global pandemic.’

This year’s Education Month also coincides with Amerindian Heritage Month. This was first introduced by the PPP/C administration which from the time it took office placed Amerindian development as a top national priority.  A Ministry of Amerindian Affairs was established.

Both are worthy of celebrations. Amerindian development is inextricably linked to access to quality education which historically had been denied to the children of Guyana and our indigenous people in particular. That trend of underdevelopment continued during the post-independence years under the PNC, which by the 1980s had reduced Guyana to one of the worst-performing countries in the entire Region in terms of education-attainment levels.

The entire cohort of the student population suffered from the deficiencies of the education delivery system, but our Amerindian children suffered the most. This was particularly so in the case of access to secondary and tertiary education. There was hardly any secondary institution in the hinterland regions and schools were ill-equipped in terms of learning-resource materials and teaching staff.

It was not until the assumption of office of the PPP/C administration on October 5, 1992 that the education tide shifted positively in terms of student-attainment levels. Our Guyanese students no longer were made to suffer the ignominy of being at the bottom of the performance ladder. Indeed, our students are today as competitive as any of their Caribbean counterparts and have on several occasions outperformed their Caribbean counterparts in several subject areas including that of the overall best-performing students at the regional CSEC and CAPE examinations.

Today, the delivery of education to our students has improved significantly all across the country, including our hinterland regions. The barrier to quality education is gradually being broken and the days of ‘privileged’ schools where only the rich could afford are now becoming a thing of the past.

These developments in education did not come about by accident. Instead, it resulted from a deep-seated philosophical outlook of the PPP/C administration in which education is seen as a right and not a privilege. In keeping with this thinking, education was seen as a national priority and several policy interventions were initiated to give effect to that orientation.

Among these were teacher training, curriculum reforms and infrastructural development, which have impacted positively on learning outcomes. Budgetary allocations to the education sector have been increased substantially.

These initiatives are now being further enhanced with the recent launch of the new Education Strategic Plan (2021-2025), which seeks to further democratise education access and delivery by addressing issues of inequity and school drop-out rates among others.

The PPP/C administration must be commended for making the resources available to correct the deficiencies of the past and putting the strategies in place to deliver quality education in a COVID-19 environment.

Already there are clear indications that the critical success factors in education are being successfully addressed. In the final analysis, it is the all-round development of our students and attainment levels at examinations that are the true determinants of success.

We have done well, but we have to continue to do better. The new Education Strategic Plan will certainly help to map the way forward.