The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

The following was motivated by recent coverage of education, most specifically the latest exam results, in both The Nassau Guardian and The Tribune.

National news outlets typically do not propose specific educational policies for reforming our struggling exam-centric public education system. Given this, a brief critique followed by suggestions.

Most education coverage revolves around reporting problems in schools and statements from education officials, like recent comments from the Minister of Education on exam results. When editorials do tackle the subject, they discuss the challenges but rarely suggest meaningful reforms or delve into the deep-rooted issues that hinder student learning and effective teaching.

While coverage acknowledges the decline in student performance in national exams and the limitations of such assessments, it often falls short in offering concrete reform proposals. Alternative assessment methods, for example, receive minimal attention.

Moreover, press coverage recognises that both the COVID-19 pandemic and ongoing issues have affected student performance. However, it largely fails to tackle the fundamental underlying reasons for these difficulties, such as the sudden and unprecedented shift to remote learning during the pandemic. What we require is a proactive evaluation of potential future disruptions, like hurricanes, in order to create well-thought-out preemptive strategies for dealing with them effectively.

Finally, stories and editorials may acknowledge the importance of education, but they often overlook the development of skills essential for the job market or tertiary education, be it at universities/colleges or technical training institutes and vocational schools.

Perhaps it’s time for investigative journalism that examines and shares challenges faced by public schools and follows up with ideas for reform. This would require collaboration with education experts, teachers, and students, but it would be a worthwhile endeavour. It means evolving beyond simply relaying educational news to enlightening readers about obstacles confronting public education and viable options for bringing about meaningful reform.

In the meantime, some thoughts on potential reforms:

• Reduce or end the reliance on standardised exams as the primary assessment tool. Place more value on assessment methods that allow students to showcase the broadest possible range of skills and abilities through, for example, project-based assessments, presentations, portfolios, and real-world problem-solving tasks.

• Related to this, require all students to engage in a curriculum that provides them with both traditional academic skills and modern vi-tech training (from say robotics to carpentry). Upon graduation, each student should have two options: entry into the job market or further formal education or a combination of both. Further, each student must have a life skills toolkit to help them navigate everyday life (eg, how to prepare for and participate in a job interview; basic finance such as a budget, the intricacies of bank loans, etc).

• Address the obvious reality that students have a broad cross-section of learning styles, interests, and paces of learning. Use teachers, technology, and adaptive learning platforms to implement individualized learning plans that better address individual needs and interests. Focus more on formative assessment to provide timely feedback to students to facilitate ongoing improvement and help identify areas where they need extra support.

• Prioritise critical thinking, problem-solving, communication, flexibility, and practical skills, and promote an in-depth understanding of the material by providing opportunities for students to apply their knowledge and skills to real-world scenarios.

• From an early age, utilise career counseling to help students explore relevant career paths and provide opportunities for skills training and apprenticeships beyond the proposed in school vi-tech requirements (eg, through collaboration with community businesses and organisations).

• Ramp up the development of important “soft” skills, including teamwork, leadership, adaptability, and emotional intelligence. Skills essential for success in both the job market and tertiary education.

• Better ensure that ongoing professional development equips teachers with the skills and strategies needed to implement 21st-century teaching methods and ones which better engage students (see above).

• Be proactive about updating the curriculum so it better mirrors evolving business trends and new career opportunities. Further, the curriculum must be more flexible and better adapted to societal needs and expectations.

• Better integrate technology into the learning process so students are skilled in their ability to access resources, including those that help personalise learning and give them the skills to take advantage of a technology-driven world.

• Ideally, the whole community would be engaged in the education of our children and schools would be one of the hubs of our communities. Meaningful partnerships with local businesses, organisations, and parents would both help provide a supportive learning environment and expose students to real-world experiences.

• Perhaps above all, inspire in students a joy of learning and an understanding that life-long learning is vital to being a productive, engaged, and happy citizen in today’s rapidly evolving world.

Briefly, reforms must prioritise students and a more comprehensive approach to learning, one that relies less on exam-based assessments. Diversifying assessment methods, focusing on practical skills, and involving the community, education systems will better prepare students for the job market, higher education, and citizenship — for life generally — while promoting the meaningful development of their talents and abilities.

We do not need outside experts to help us address the challenges facing public education. Further, no matter how successful they are, we shouldn’t attempt to replicate educational models from other countries (eg, Singapore). The current exam-based system carried over from our colonial experience shows that this approach isn’t effective for the vast majority of our students. The Bahamas possesses the talent required — at UB, in the Ministry of Education, in our schools — to design and implement a system tailored to its needs as a nation that exists in the 21st Century.

In closing, this is a call for our national media to conduct systematic, in-depth research into and reporting about public education. While such investigative journalism is typically directed at unearthing secrets, the state of public education is not secret. Nevertheless, it remains a mystery why successive administrations have not implemented meaningful reforms over the past 50 years since independence. It’s time to solve the mystery while, at the same time, providing readers with a starting point for a public discussion of future courses of action.

Whether or not we have children in the system of public education is immaterial. Public education is society’s responsibility. It is not solely the purview of politicians, the MOE bureaucracy and its teachers, parents and current students. Our nation’s future hinges on making it our collective duty.

CHRIS MINNS

Exuma,

September 7, 2023.