PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC) — The Trinidad and Tobago government Friday said there may be “implications for teachers’ terms and conditions” of employment as it responded to a statement earlier this month that teachers would no longer mark the School Based Assessment (SBA) from September unless they are compensated.

Leader of Government Business in the Trinidad and Tobago Parliament, Camille Robinson Regis, in a prepared response to a question from the opposition, said the Ministry of Education would be consulting with various stakeholders including the Chief personnel Officer “and our legal services division for the guidance on the way forward”.

President of the Trinidad and Tobago Unified Teachers Association (TTUTA) Lynsley Doodhai, speaking at a recent ceremony for retired educators, said teachers were under no obligation to mark the SBAs of pupils as this is a responsibility for the Barbados-based Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC), an external agency.

He said CXC is not the employer of teachers and cannot demand they work for free to grade the papers. He told the ceremony that last year, two union resolutions were passed dealing with SBA’s and a decision was made for teachers to no longer mark SBAs from September.

“One resolution mandated that legal recourse be taken to obtain a final interpretation on the marking of SBAs, given the consistent refusal of the CXC to entertain the payment of teachers, whilst the second resolution called on teachers to not mark any newly introduced SBA’s, including Mathematics and English A with immediate effect.

“Colleagues I want to divulge to you today that the association has had in-depth consultation with our attorneys, who have advised that our members are under no obligation to mark SBAs if they are not remunerated for doing so.

“I therefore want to give the Ministry of education and CXC ample notice that from September 2018 when the new academic year begins, teachers will not be marking SBAs unless they are compensated. Let me repeat teachers will not be marking SBAs from September 2018 unless they are paid to do so,” he said.

Robinson-Regis, who was answering the question on behalf of Education Minister Anthony Garcia, who is attending a University of the West Indies (UWI) Council meeting overseas, told legislators that the authorities would be ‘encouraging and engaging our stakeholders on this matter inclusive of the National Parents Teachers Association and the Secondary Schools Principals Association”.

Trinidad and Tobago teachers are not the only ones who have registered their disagreement with the present situation regarding the SBAs.

In 2015, the Barbados government warned teachers could face disciplinary action if they maintain their position of not marking SBAs unless compensated, saying it regards the position adopted by the Barbados Secondary Teachers Union (BSTU) and the Barbados Union of Teachers (BUT) as “unreasonable”.

The Caribbean Union of Teachers (CUT) has already said it is prepared to engage its entire membership across the region regarding the situation.