Trench Town High School – situated in Kingston’s troubled west end – is at the other end of the scale from Immaculate… literally. It ranked last in the A-Quest April 2004 study of how well students in the island’s 52 traditional high schools performed in the 2003 CXC examinations.

But principal Grace Smith is not likely to get her hackles up over the backlash that the poor ranking in the CXC exams is likely to cause since she has more pressing matters on her hands. For Smith and the rest of her teaching staff, the task at hand involves getting the near 70 per cent of students in grades 7 and 8 reading at their age levels.

“Many of our students come in not being able to read, and some just barely able,” Smith explained. “I normally get 150 students for grade 7, and what you find is that at least 70 per cent of them are not able to read at their level (and) we have to spend a lot of time on remedial work,” she informed the Sunday Observer. This often meant that teachers were unable to complete the CXC syllabus.

To be fair, Smith stressed, there were students who regularly obtained distinctions in one or two subject areas, with the occasional student gaining passes in up to seven and eight subjects.

But she explained that the task of getting students to do well in external exams, while not insurmountable, was made the more difficult because the school was at a disadvantage. “Our student intake is different, in that we do not get students who are performing at the high level,” she said.

According to Smith, the GSAT exams, which replaced the Common Entrance Examination (CEE), have made a big difference to the intake. When the Common Entrance was in place, “we selected students ourselves”, she explained, adding that because the numbers allocated by the ministry through this process was “so small”, the school would invite students living near to the school, but who didn’t get a pass to the school of their choice, to come in.

“With the coming of GSAT, we just simply absorb the students who live in the community and do the GSAT,” she continued. “Those who do very well on the GSAT, no doubt, did not select our school, nor were they placed here by the ministry, they went on to other schools; and so we are left with the students who are performing at the bottom,” the principal added.

“You find that along with the poor academic performance you also get behavioural problems. So we also spend a lot of time dealing with disciplinary problems to try and get students to conform,” the principal noted.

According to Grade 11 co-ordinator, Norbert Forsythe, a number of students attending the school also had no parental guidance or support. This often resulted in teachers having to stand in for parents, providing love, guidance and support. This support often extended to financial assistance. In fact, although the Government and the National Commercial Bank took away some of the burden of examination fees for the island’s students writing key CXC subjects, Trench Town teachers still continue to take money out of their pockets to assist needy students unable to come up with entrance fees, he said.

“It is a very traumatic time for students and teachers when it is time to sign up and pay for the CXC exams,” the co-ordinator explained. “Sometimes the students come to us in tears because the parents either cannot afford to pay the fees, or do not understand the importance of pushing to have them sit these exams,” he said.

“Of course, you also find some students losing focus, and some dropping out, again, because of the many factors which impinge on their abilities,” he continued. “For example, you may find a child coming to school in the morning tired and sleepy because he or she spent the night at a dance or was kept awake by the loud music.”

In the meantime, Trench Town is banking on a present batch of approximately 30 grade 10 students to improve its showing in the 2005 CXC examinations. “There is a group of about 30 students who seem as if they are going to make the dream of attaining passes in five or more subjects come through,” Smith said, struggling to contain the excitement in her voice. The majority of these students, she said, utilised the free extra lessons offered by the school.

The long-term plan now is to get the overall subject passes up to at least five or six for each student, she explained. In keeping with this plan, the school recently introduced a “one-hour” after-school programme, sponsored by the Research Community for The Study of Jamaica, a group based overseas.

The programme targets grade 9 students, providing them with free Math and English extra lessons at the end of the official school day. “We selected grade nine because this is where we are targeting now for improved CXC passes.” This programme is compulsory for all grade 9 students.

Head boy, Ishmael Wiggan, 17, is one student who never misses an opportunity to make use of the extra assistance offered free of cost by his teachers. “Every day I spend at least five to six hours studying,” said Wiggan, who lives in Arnett Gardens and who will be sitting eight subjects in the CXC exams next month.

“He has performed consistently from grade 7 and we expect him to do really well,” Smith said.

Wiggan, who is also a member of the Jamaica Observer’s TeenAge Club, attributes his good study habits to his parents, family members, principal, teachers and church brethren. “They motivate me. They keep pushing me to do well and they keep encouraging me,” he said.