So the new Government wants to keep students in high schools for seven years, instead of five. This will bring down the unemployment figures in the short run, as teenaged unemployed people will now be statistically listed as students. It should also make a good campaign advertisement in the next general election, which might come long before the five-year term is completed, given the Government’s one-seat majority in the House of Representatives and what could happen as a result.

But I am not sure that it will help the students as the classrooms will become even more crowded. Does this mean that the Government plans to reverse the decision to abolish the shift system? Does this mean that there are now to be three shifts instead of two? How else can it be done when there is a shortage of schools and a perennial shortage of teachers who are consistently leaving the profession for greener pastures?

It is one thing to say that the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) is now committed to free education, and gone are the days when the JLP’s founder Sir Alexander Bustamante remarked that ‘salt fish is better than education’. Indeed, it is all to the good that the two major political parties are now competing with each other to see which party can offer a better education product to Jamaican students. But aren’t we overdoing this student tenure business given the nation’s slender resources?

As far as I am concerned, the only students that need to be prioritised in making sure that they are in school are those who are not attending school at all. And it is not just the present Government that has mooted this idea of having students spend a longer time in schools. Some have suggested that students need a longer school week that goes up to Saturdays. Some, including Ronald Thwaites, the former minister of education, have suggested that the summer holidays be shortened.

What I might agree with is the lengthening of the schoolday. But the students need their weekends for study, domestic chores, and also to earn some money in some instances. I would like to add that they should all be encouraged to go to church on the weekends also. For the same reason, students need the summer holidays; as well it is impossible to learn much in a hot Jamaican summer, which is why even summer schools do not have much impact.

It is contradictory for anyone to encourage the churches and other groups to have summer camps to teach morality, discipline and other good things while shortening the period to do so. We should also remember that hundreds of Jamaican students travel overseas to their parents every summer to be fitted out with clothing and other supplies for the year. And the whole business of “back to school” takes a whole summer to purchase textbooks.

The very first time that I ever heard the idea mooted for a return to a longer school week, as was the case up to 80 years ago islandwide, and less than 60 years ago in some schools, was from the then general manager of a large food processing company. Whenever I hear some new idea mooted I look at who it is coming from — although I never judge anyone by who their relatives are, as is done to me daily or even hourly.

To be fair to Education Minister Ruel Reid, he is not suggesting either longer school terms or longer school weeks. But, as I wrote some years ago, I think that the food processors’ call for longer school hours, longer school weeks, longer school terms, or a longer time in schools is related to the school canteens. And the suggestion to keep students longer in schools is, to my mind, a variation of the same plan.

Just about every school in Jamaica provides a cooked meal that includes rice for students. Who sells the rice to the canteens? This being Jamaica, just about every school canteen sells patties. Who sells the flour to the patty manufacturers? Aren’t school canteens the greatest part of the patty market? Where do the school canteens buy bottled or boxed soft drinks and boxed juices?

So it is no wonder that owners and managers of food processing companies would either want more students in the schools to buy food or the same number of students who either go to school for six days or for a lengthier summer term. Don’t owners of large food processing companies contribute to the election campaigns of both major political parties? Is this plan to keep the ‘schoolers’ for two more years the other end of the bargain? Is this payback time?

Canteens are such big businesses that certain fast food companies now run them in some high school and university campuses. And while there is nothing wrong with that, it goes without saying that these fast food companies would not be there if it was not profitable, hence my point about the canteens being big business. And, of course, they rely on the food processing and wholesale companies to keep themselves in business, who in turn would definitely want more students in schools to increase their profits.

Indeed, one could even ask if this is why it seems to the naked eye that the entry rules of both these tertiary level institutions have been relaxed. Was it to allow more students in to purchase food in the canteens? These questions that I ask are far-fetched only to the naïve who do not really understand what is going on. And, again, my speculations are based on people in the food industry who spoke in favour of longer school hours, weeks or terms and wanted more students in schools long before any politician said so.

Should we lower the standard of education further by keeping students for two more years in already overpopulated schools? Isn’t it better to suggest outside classes for those who have already had their time in school but failed? And why would anyone want to keep students who have already passed their examinations for two more years in school? Is it to play with the unemployment statistics? Is it to accommodate someone’s profit?

ekrubm765@yahoo.com