If graduates were cars coming out of a factory, most of them would have to be towed from the assembly line directly to the dump. Uou would not be able to sell those cars.

We need to look at schools as factories for producing competent citizens. If the citizens do not meet the specifications we should have them returned to the factories to be remanufactured.

To determine the performance of the factories we need to have very clear specifications on the citizens and what they should be able to do when they leave the factory. We know what a car or a microwave should be capable of when they leave the factories. Citizens are far more important so we should be a lot clearer on what they should be capable of when they leave the factory.

Just as workers and managers of factories are held accountable for the products they produce; teachers, school administrators, Ministry of Education personnel, the Minister of Education, and the government should be held responsible for the products from the school.

What should we do?

First we should define the problem. Second we should define clearly what outcome we want. We should describe the products we expect from the schools. Thirdly, we should determine the resources needed to produce the product we want. Finally we should put a process-monitoring system in place to feed back to the factory how the products measure against the expectations.

The state of education in the Bahamas is at the crisis point. There are few, if any, institutions you can look to and reliably expect the products to be of consistently high quality. Too many of the responsible people are busy trying not to be blamed or trying to say there are no problems. WE HAVE A PROBLEM IN EDUCATION!

I will have more to say on this later. We will deal with the Ministry of Education, the schools, the teachers, The curriculum, and the society.

Yes! I totally agree, unless students overly apply themselves, parents could kiss a quality education goodbye. :cop:

The problem could be fixed.

First of all we have to end social promotion. That is, passing a kid on to second form even if he has not mastered first form's work. I am told we are doing this now - let us wait and see.

Second, teachers must be paid more. You will not attract the best and the brightest if you pay them a pittance. They should also, as you suggest be evaluated each year and any promotion or pay rises would be linked to their results.

Thirdly, I ask myself, "are the kids being challenged enough?" School can be a boring place for a child that is used to the fast paced world of the Internet, slick movies and other well produced entertainment. You might say that education is not entertainment. It part that is true - the fundamentals must be grasped but it can be done in a way that is fun! As for the rest of education it can be a great adventure and it should be made so. The human brain seeks information and stimulation it is hungry for both. The human is a curious creature. It wants to know! It will listen and absorb when things are done in the right manner. Many kids can quote to you the lyrics of the latest songs after hearing them once or twice, but they cannot give you an intelligent synopsis of the history they have been studying for a full term!!! Why is that? Because the music is fun, it speaks to the kids. Education is a chore, a duty, that to few are mastering, fewer still are understanding. Change the way we teach and the results will astonish you!

Last, but not least, Mum and Dad must be closely involved in their children's education. They must work with the teacher. They must demand that homework be done, and done well. They must be alarmed when they see the grades dropping and demand, from the kids and the school, an explanation. Then they must stand ready to do what must be done to fix the problem.

EBO ....
Have you ever heard about the "human development index"??
you would be surprised at where the bahamas ranked among other countries, in terms of development!

maybe you should compare us to other nations, before you go about saying that the entire country is producing dummies!
:shhh:

There's only one school in New Providence which is forward looking and stands up to any degree of rigorous investigation of its results and facilities...but unfortunately it is beyond the financial reach of most Bahamians.....take a bow St Andrew's School.

I dont know, but I went to school in the Bahamas and then in the UK. I was a grade d-f student in the Bahamas, then became a grade a-c student in the UK, maybe it was just the teachers??

I also think it has alot to do with the individuals as well, whether they want to learn or if the enviroment is good for learning, obviously if the school is run down, they live in dispicable home conditions, abusive or non involved parents, or gangs at to or from their school, then it will be harder for the student to get more involved with learning as they have so many other things on their minds. The ones that do achieve alot.

Well good for you, Rory, that you improved your 'grade standard' when you went overseas but that proves nothing in relation to the relative merits of each system or school. It's like those silly car stickers proclaiming that "My Child made the Honour Roll at...". Well, so what, the standard that got your child onto the Honour Roll at that school might be so low that you wouldn't stand a hope at a neighbouring school with a higher standard. Therefore, why think it is something to shout from the rooftops when it is obvious that it tells very little about true academic excellence in the first place.

Just look at the appalling BGSCE results of most schools to ascertain how low a standard of excellence is at different schools. If a student makes a school's honour roll and doesnt perform well on the national exams..then who is to blame and how high can the school standard actually be?

Maybe some schools deliberately 'dumb down' their honour roll standards to keep the parents and students happy by kidding them that they are doing well when really the standard is so low.

Well good for you, Rory, that you improved your 'grade standard' when you went overseas but that proves nothing in relation to the relative merits of each system or school. It's like those silly car stickers proclaiming that "My Child made the Honour Roll at...". Well, so what, the standard that got your child onto the Honour Roll at that school might be so low that you wouldn't stand a hope at a neighbouring school with a higher standard. Therefore, why think it is something to shout from the rooftops when it is obvious that it tells very little about true academic excellence in the first place.

Just look at the appalling BGSCE results of most schools to ascertain how low a standard of excellence is at different schools. If a student makes a school's honour roll and doesnt perform well on the national exams..then who is to blame and how high can the school standard actually be?

Maybe some schools deliberately 'dumb down' their honour roll standards to keep the parents and students happy by kidding them that they are doing well when really the standard is so low.


Ok, lets put it another way.

When I came back to the Bahamas, in order to get into COB, I had to have the local government translate my UK grades into Bahamian grades based on the UK standards against the Bahamian standards. My UK C was a Bahamian A, and so on. This was direct from the ministry of education and put on government paper.

That was some time ago, so not sure how things are now in either education system.

And by the way, there is no such thing as honor roll or graduation in the UK. Thats also not to say that anyone that schools in the UK is smart or can even read for that, as there is alot of illiteracy over there also, and there are different standards for different schools. The first school I went to I was getting A's, it was government school, the second one I was getting C's etc, it was a private boarding school, and I was working harder in the second school.

So you see, different systems actually, there were actually 2 different sets of GCE systems at the time. Plus the fact that more people in my classes were getting 90-100% so the grade level rose higher. What was a B% level grade in the government school was now a C% in the second school.

Ok, lets put it another way.

When I came back to the Bahamas, in order to get into COB, I had to have the local government translate my UK grades into Bahamian grades based on the UK standards against the Bahamian standards. My UK C was a Bahamian A, and so on. This was direct from the ministry of education and put on government paper.

That was some time ago, so not sure how things are now in either education system.

And by the way, there is no such thing as honor roll or graduation in the UK. Thats also not to say that anyone that schools in the UK is smart or can even read for that, as there is alot of illiteracy over there also, and there are different standards for different schools. The first school I went to I was getting A's, it was government school, the second one I was getting C's etc, it was a private boarding school, and I was working harder in the second school.

So you see, different systems actually, there were actually 2 different sets of GCE systems at the time. Plus the fact that more people in my classes were getting 90-100% so the grade level rose higher. What was a B% level grade in the government school was now a C% in the second school.


ya know rory i have been saying this for a long time!!

"If you base bahamian talent on the underprepared, underfunded ridiculous setting and set up as the bgcse, you would think the entire bahamas is a gaggle of dumb bunnies"

the test just isnt a true measure of bahamian talent..it just isnt!

My problem is that we encourage this stupidness with this BGCSE results. F is a passing grade in the BGCSE if anyone bother to look in the back of one of those result strips. And most of these resumes only asks for the number of BGCSEs not the grades....which means I can pay my $15 per subject do the test and do little to nothing on the tests. In the end if i do 5 subjects and i get all F or Gs, it dosent matter because i still have 5 BGCSEs that i can put on my resume. Its a double standard! How can the MOE try to push for A, B,C if they continue to except D, and Fs?!

My problem is that we encourage this stupidness with this BGCSE results. F is a passing grade in the BGCSE if anyone bother to look in the back of one of those result strips. And most of these resumes only asks for the number of BGCSEs not the grades....which means I can pay my $15 per subject do the test and do little to nothing on the tests. In the end if i do 5 subjects and i get all F or Gs, it dosent matter because i still have 5 BGCSEs that i can put on my resume. Its a double standard! How can the MOE try to push for A, B,C if they continue to except D, and Fs?!

When I was teaching here is how I graded.
100% was an "A"
99% was a "B"
98% was a "C"
97% was a "D"
Everything else was an "F" and an "F" - a fail!!!! No grade at all.

Surprisingly, I had few "F's." I challenged my students. I told them "I don't want a Doctor who was 50% right! I did not want a Lawyer who understood only 60% of the law! I don't want a Pastor who has only a 30% grasp of his Biblical knowledge. In whatever endeavor, I wanted someone was who was 100%. You owe me that as your patient, client, or whatever field you follow."

They rose to the challenge! Kids can, and do!

Mind you that was years ago in the U.S.. I doubt I could get away with that now. Today, if a student can grasp 50% of the material, one must think oneself lucky!

If graduates were cars coming out of a factory, most of them would have to be towed from the assembly line directly to the dump. Uou would not be able to sell those cars.


This made me laught very, very loud.
But I agree to a point.

My problem is that we encourage this stupidness with this BGCSE results. F is a passing grade in the BGCSE if anyone bother to look in the back of one of those result strips. And most of these resumes only asks for the number of BGCSEs not the grades....which means I can pay my $15 per subject do the test and do little to nothing on the tests. In the end if i do 5 subjects and i get all F or Gs, it dosent matter because i still have 5 BGCSEs that i can put on my resume. Its a double standard! How can the MOE try to push for A, B,C if they continue to except D, and Fs?!


I totally agree guy. I think what it boils down to is that the govt. wants to have as many passes as possible. I recently took the BGCSE and did a lot better than i was expecting (no grades in the lower levels)

CG kids can do...
but only what they are expected to do...not an imaginary or false representaion of what we think they should be doing!

you know why people dont pay attention to the bgcse, becasue they realize that they have found intelligent gems in the ones who supposedly are supposed to be dummies!
and that the exam is a bunch of fooey!!!

are kids are performing...not as fast as an american style culture when it comes to street smarts, but book smarts, studying and preparedness...we are light years ahead of any american student!

if you want your precious grade point average of the bgcse to go to a b+, fix the stuipic exam so the majority of the kids have a chance to at least pass it by..
1, following the course outline to the t
and
2 the grading policy should be available to all who want to get an a could get an A
and 3 administer the test, to what a bahamian student can respond to, not what standardized tests tell us what it should be!

it so funny that the bgcse was supposed to put an end to all of the harms the gce had to the student, but apprently instead of england doing it to us.,.....we are doing it to ourselves!
:rolleyes:

YK2bad the bgcse exams are still supervised by the Cambridge Board of Education.

Be careful in what you ask for: we don't want to 'dumb down' the exams just because we are the Bahamas.

We need to resource our schools better, give teachers in-service training, and some how turn the attitude to a good education around in the minds of our young.

Let's start NOW because there is a lot of miles ahead to get things looking good.