IN a bid to rescue male students who continue to underachieve in comparison to their female counterparts, the Ministry of Education, in collaboration with the Jamaica Teaching Council, last Thursday launched an initiative aimed at empowering male students across the island.

The programme, dubbed ‘Advancing the Education of Boys’, is aimed at devising teaching strategies to better respond to the needs of male students, said education officer at the Ministry of Education (MOE) Warren Kidd.

The programme is scheduled to run for three years, and will be piloted in 13 schools where boys are said to be underachieving.

The schools are: In region one, Camperdown High, Donald Quarrie High, Vauxhall High, Dunoon Technical High; in region two, Islington High, St Mary Technical High, Iona High School, and Oracabessa High School; and in region three, Ferncourt High, Aabuthnott Gallimore High, Brown’s Town High, and Ocho Rios High. One other school is to be added to the list, Kidd said.

“We have to look at how we are serving boys in our education institutions. Most of our Rhodes Scholars are boys, which means that we do not have a problem with aptitude. What we have a problem with is motivating our boys,” noted June Hastings, director of the Education System Transformation Programme.

“We have a problem in motivating them to want to learn and motivating the boys to behave in the way that we want them to behave,” continued Hastings. “But education has changed, boys are less malleable because of the testosterone. And most of our problems stem from those entering puberty and, unfortunately, at the same time entering high schools.”

According to Hipolina Josephs, programmes officer for education at the Commonwealth Secretariat, which is aiding the initiative, Thursday’s programme is part of a regional approach to address the needs of male students within the Caribbean. It is based on research carried out within the island, as well as in Trinidad and Tobago, St Lucia, and St Kitts, she said.

Among some of the workable solutions, Josephs noted, were the introduction of same-sex schools in Trinidad and Tobago; and the introduction of same-sex classrooms within co-ed schools in St Kitts. These measures — while they are not novel in Jamaica — have helped to bolster the academic performances of boys in the respective countries.

Statistics provided by the MOE revealed that in the 2012 CSEC examinations, 6,383 students passed five or more subjects, including Mathematics and English Language. Of that number 4,178 were females, while 2,205 were boys. In the meantime, of the 4,285 students who passed five or more subjects with English Language only 3,082 were females, while 1,203 were boys; and of the 981 students who passed five or more subjects with Mathematics only, 506 were females while 475 were males.

“It underscores the importance of us ensuring that we cater to the needs of our boys in particular. It is not about how much we are able to give them; it is about the motivation, and it is about customising the programmes that we have,” said Grace McLean, chief education officer at the MOE. “We have to find the programmes that are attractive, that are trendy, that will motivate any young person, and we have to customise the kind of education, the kind of curriculum that will see our boys being gainfully engaged,” she added.

At least 24 male students from some of the high schools selected as part of the pilot programme attended Thursday’s function, and participated in an exercise that allowed them to offer suggestions on how teachers can better engage male students.

Some of their suggestions were: the enabling of more interactive classroom settings, the bolstering of information technology programmes in school, an increase in resources such as computers, and an increase in the number of male rolemodels, including male teachers within the school system.