There must be investment by countries in their education sectors if there is to be development; President Donald Ramotar highlighted, when he addressed a meeting of Champions of the United Nations Secretary General’s Global Initiative on Education.
The Guyanese Head of State said, “There is enough evidence to show that countries which have developed the most, are not necessarily the countries that have the most natural resources but the countries where you have a high educational standard”.
President Ramotar was selected to be a member of the United Nations Steering Committee to examine the world’s education system and make recommendations for its improvement.
The Guyanese Leader added that it is essential that both boys and girls are educated to ensure that countries and the world move forward. The fact that Guyana has the highest number of nursery school enrolments in the Caribbean, universal achievement of primary education and is on the path to attaining universal secondary education within three years, were mentioned by the president.
The quality of education, President Ramotar said, was improving in Guyana with trained teachers alone moving from 58%, five years ago to 75% at present. “We want to raise the standard of education and we are investing quite a lot in the physical infrastructure- the schools and the facilities. We’re trying to help with developing more critical skills, life skills in our people, and we want to ensure the relevance of the education system towards the national focus. We are trying to do that by extending education levels in all parts of our country”.
Another important area, President Ramotar spoke of, is government’s investment in equipping persons with technical skills, but the challenge remains of ensuring sustainability and affordability, enabling each child to reach his or her full potential.
Intellectual property rights, and the cost of textbooks remain a challenge that needs to be addressed, said President Ramotar. “This is something that the international community will have to look at, in order to ensure that developing countries are not left behind as far as quality is concerned”.
The availability of technology was another challenge, mentioned by President Ramotar and he explained that whilst government has embarked on the “One Laptop Per Family” programme, further support would be welcomed, “so that we could have access to other education opportunities in our remote areas where we could use technology, in order to deliver education to our people, in every part of our country”.
In closing, President Ramotar said that the UN Secretary General could continue to rely on Guyana to persist with various initiatives in the sector, with the international community. Referring to the figures which indicate that millions of children are deprived of a basic education, he explained that a lot of it, is tragic, and can be attributed to international politics. “Peace is very vital to education, peace and education are linked. We will not be able to achieve these goals that we are setting ourselves…we all have to work for peace as a precondition to delivering quality education to all our people”.
You must be logged in to post a comment.