By Claudine Housen, Staff ReporterWESTERN BUREAU:
WENTWORTH GABBIDON, president of the Jamaica Teachers' Association (JTA), yesterday appealed to private sector organisations to support education.
Mr. Gabbidon, who was speaking at a Teachers' Day Luncheon honouring teachers in Westmoreland at the Grand Lido Hotel in Negril, said that while the JTA was pleased to be working with private sector organisations such as The Gleaner Company, there was still a need for greater support in education. Yesterday's luncheon was hosted by The Gleaner Company.
Said Mr. Gabbidon: "Education is a national imperative and cannot be seen as the responsibility of just teachers and government. Provision must be made to ensure that all our students can attend school and benefit from the teaching and learning experience."
Turning to The Gleaner, Mr. Gabbidon said: "The JTA is pleased to be associated with The Gleaner, one of our major partners in education. Many more businesses need to make commitments of a similar fashion in an effort to improve the education system."
'PERFORMANCE PAY'
While he posited that education was the national imperative, the JTA head raised the point that the Education Ministry's proposed 'performance pay' programme was heading in the wrong direction.
"There are those who would have us believe that the way to improve the system is to simply pay teachers by performance," he said. "I need not tell you how wrong those pundits are in their assumption that money equals commitment and dedication to a cause. I would never wish to see the day when the motivation for doing well as a teacher becomes money, so you simply work towards getting an increment at the end of the year," Gabbidon argued.
He also negated the proposition of adding an extra hour to schools for homework and instead urged parents to play a greater role in the lives of their children.
