Saffiyah Edoo
Despite the mixed opinions about scholarships at HSC level, it is heartwarming to see laureates and successful candidates every year. Their hard work acknowledged and rewarded; another level “unlocked” in the course of their lives. The ones we saw last week, however, are a dying breed. Candidates sitting for HSC exams in 2024 will be the last batch from the pre-Dookun reform era, meaning that the ensuing year will be the real litmus test for this government’s educational reforms.
With the NYCBE system, a series of new measures has been implemented. Among the most laudable ones is the spacing of exam loads thrust on PSAC students for History/Geography and Science, arguably the two bulkiest subjects, and the allocation of regional schools. However, there are a number of issues that the Ministry is still struggling to get right even though it has had ample time to put in place, troubleshoot and perfect. In the first place, the Ministry has failed to set up and run a suitable online schooling system as the default tool whenever the school calendar is subjected to adverse weather conditions or other interruptions. One of the reasons put forward was the fact that many students do not have access to proper internet connection to be able to attend classes. Paradoxically, though, the same internet connection touted as an impediment to implement online schooling is now being urgently requested by well-meaning teachers to counter yet another shortcoming of the Ministry.
Since 2020, schoolbooks have been offered by the MoE free of charge to students up to Grade 9, in a bid to make educational resources more accessible to all Mauritian students, at least to those in the public schooling system. Today though, many of us parents find ourselves wishing that schoolbooks were still on sale. To date, a number of schools are yet to receive textbooks to be distributed to students, almost a month after the academic year has started. This brings forth a few interrogations. Doesn’t the ministry have a system in place that ensures timely printing and distribution of textbooks in school given it is the body which decides on academic calendars? How come the Ministry could ensure that textbooks were readily available on time for the start of the school year in bookshops prior to the implementation of the free textbook initiative but struggles to do it now? How will it deliver on its promise of “leaving no child behind” when it is spectacularly failing in the provision of most basic learning tool?
Proactive teachers, who are conscious of time going by, devise strategies to remain on schedule with their syllabus. They ask students for mobile phone numbers to set up WhatsApp groups for more effective distribution of homework. They also ask students to access books on the MIE website so that they may continue their program, which brings us to the paradox mentioned above. One of the arguments put forward regarding the implementation of online schooling for government schools is the fact that not all students have access to appropriate internet connection, and yet here are teachers having to resort to asking students to use an internet connection to access resources which are supposed to be provided for free by the government. Sadly, the absurd does not stop here.
Recently, a conversation with a secondary school education officer revealed that students of the Extended Stream used to be the “laissés-pour-compte” when it came to receiving textbooks at the start of the academic year. For a couple of years, they received their textbooks well into the academic year, contrary to this year, where the distribution was done in time for January, unlike that of mainstream students, which begs the question: can the Ministry ever get things right? How can 10 years not be time enough for this government to do things properly when it comes to education, one of the key ministries of any country? How much more time does this Ministry need to finally be worthy of its appellation? How can it ask laureates to come back to serve Mauritius when it is doing the opposite to tomorrow’s generation?
Many of us cannot help but think that there is an almost Machiavellian plan behind the flippancy with which the matter of education is taken in Mauritius. With the lowering of thresholds in national exams and automatic promotion, it is no wonder that students have difficulties to cope when it comes to examinations of international levels, which leaves us with many who do not have the capacity to formulate coherent and critical thinking because they are barred from entering higher levels of education. One has to wonder: is this not the ultimate aim? To have a mass of people who are too busy toiling to earn their daily bread, with no capacity to think to be able to discern whatever wrongs that might be committed towards them and to take whatever scraps that are being thrown to them as absolution from those at the top? The most cynic of us are reminded of the famous Kreol saying ‘bomarse kout ser’ or in this case ‘gratwi kout ser’ and there might still be time to ponder on this and start rising from slumber… or is it too late?
With the lowering of thresholds in national exams and automatic promotion, it is no wonder that students have difficulties to cope when it comes to examinations of international levels, which leaves us with many who do not have the capacity to formulate coherent and critical thinking because they are barred from entering
higher levels of education.