ACCORDING to Education Minister Priya Manickchand, Guyana is on course to provide universal secondary education to all Guyanese students following the completion of the primary education cycle.
This is indeed a welcome development. What this meant in effect is that students on completion of their primary education would no longer be placed at community high schools or ‘primary tops’ if they did not obtain the required marks at the National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA) examinations.

Those institutions do not allow students to prepare adequately for the Caribbean Secondary Examination Certificate (CSEC). And for many, it was just a case of marking time until the end of the formal education cycle.
Since the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) assumed office in 1992, much was done to correct that unfortunate situation. Under the Secondary School Reform Programme (SSRP,) a significant number of ‘primary tops’ and community high schools were upgraded to discrete secondary schools to provide students with an opportunity to prepare for the CSEC examinations.

In addition, several new secondary schools were constructed. Expansions were also done to several others to accommodate more students who could benefit from secondary education.
And, as pointed out by Minister Manickchand, the rebuilding of St Rose’s High School and the North Ruimveldt Secondary School, and the construction of the Yarrowkabra Secondary School, the Good Hope Secondary School, and the expansion of other schools such as East Ruimveldt Secondary, Queen’s College and the Bishops’ High School, will create more space to accommodate the growing number of learners.

The fact is that under the previous People’s National Congress (PNC)-controlled administration, the education sector was severely under-resourced, both in terms of trained teachers and the availability of adequate secondary school places.

More than half of the students who wrote the then Common Entrance examination were sent to community high schools or the tops of primary schools.
One consequence of the neglect of the education sector in general and the secondary education programme by the PNC regime was a steep decline in student-attainment levels at the CSEC examinations.

Such was the extent of the decline that Guyana was ranked as the lowest-performing country at the regional examinations.
All of that has now changed, thanks to the emphasis placed by the PPP/C administration on the education sector. President, Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali has indicated that the government plans to allocate 20 per cent of the country’s budget to expand and improve the education sector.

This commitment was made at a leaders’ roundtable on transforming education worldwide during one of the sessions chaired by President Ali at the United Nations headquarters recently in New York.
The reform of the secondary education programme is an integral part of the modernization of the education system as a whole, especially in the context of the transformation processes which are now taking place in the country. And according to President Ali, his administration is working to create a 21st-century education system in the country which will see, among other developments, free education from nursery to university levels.

These are indeed laudable and forward-looking approaches on the part of President Ali and the PPP/C administration. Education is the main vehicle for economic and social progress as the experiences of so many countries in the world have demonstrated.

But at an even more fundamental level, it leads to a situation of empowerment of a critical mass of people, both at the cultural and intellectual levels which is a critical ingredient as we seek to advance the ‘One Guyana’ agenda as envisaged by President Ali.