Imagine arriving at the airport for your trip only to hear that the pilots have quit their jobs and the airline has replaced them with the customer service staff. Would you fly? Would you even be happy with last night’s graduates from aviation school compared to a seasoned crew with thousands of hours of flying time under their belts?

If Jamaica’s best teachers and other professionals consistently quit their positions at a pace that defies replacement, and leave the country, what kind of educational and national development outcomes should one reasonably expect?

Other than parents, teachers have the greatest responsibility and exert the most influence on the individual’s development. Any viable society, therefore, should want to retain their best.

The fact that high turnover is a feature of the Jamaican education system is not a defence or an excuse for the current mass teacher migration, neither is it grounds to ignore the reasons behind why they leave. People, teachers included, do not leave the safety of belonging and everything that connects them to spirit and identity to become strangers in often hostile spaces, just for the hell of it.

Migration is mostly grounded in economics, lack of opportunities overall, and poor working conditions — the forced choice between soul and stomach. Luxembourg, Germany, Canada, Netherlands, and Australia have the highest paid teachers in the world and high standard of living overall. Their teachers are not flocking to the US.

Jamaica’s teachers, nurses, and police personnel are mostly among those trying to work their way out of poverty. While their jobs may provide a modicum of stability, or even respectability, actual living remains subsistent because they do not earn enough to realise financial growth. If better opportunities beckon, many will take it.

Teachers are also enormously impacted by deteriorating social conditions. In fact, given the ecosystem that every school represents, teachers are more aware of the challenges, including risks to themselves. They are the ultimate front-line workers in a warfare that is physical, psychological, and cultural — and they have little or no tools to respond.

Some key research findings offer insight into push factors driving migration among teachers as a critical subset of the population. Taken in isolation, any one of these following data points is bad enough, but synthesizing them paints a grim picture of where the country is, where it might be headed, and the mood of the people.

1) With an average of 43.00/100,000 homicides in 2022 (49/100,000 in 2021) Jamaica ranks second among the most murderous countries in the world, behind El Salvador with a rate of 52 per 100,000.

2) Among countries suffering from the migration of its most educated people, Jamaica also comes in second, sandwiched between Samoa and Palestine, on the list of 177 countries according to research done between 2007 and 2022, by the website www.theglobaleconomy.com.

3) Transparency International’s global corruption scale (2019) showed that 78 per cent of Jamaicans believe corruption is widespread. Fifty per cent believe most, or all, members of the constabulary are corrupt, as well as 44 per cent of legislators and 39 per cent of government officials.

4) A 2018 study, part of the Americas Barometer Survey, found that more than 56 per cent of Jamaicans would support a military coup in order to root out crime and corruption. This was a 39.7 per cent increase over 2006. The previous high was 49.2 per cent in 2014.

5) In an August 2022 poll by researcher Don Anderson, 93 per cent of Jamaicans say they have little or no confidence in National Security Minister Horace Chang; 91 per cent express the same about Police Commissioner Major General Antony Anderson.

None of this data aligns with the main goals of Vision 2030: Jamaica’s National Development Plan — empower Jamaicans, create a stable society, create a prosperous economy, and a healthy environment. Rather, they are colliding directly with the plan, resulting with in the proverbial catch 22 situation. Without the human capital to operationalise change conditions will worsen and, as they do, more people will look for opportunities elsewhere. Massive flight of a society’s best human capital in an indication of a collapsing society. Note that the data puts us in company with Haiti, Somalia, Eritrea, and Salvador.

“It is clear that the country needs to radically realign its priorities to make human capital development its major focus over the next eight years if we are to have a realistic chance of transforming our country for the better,” observed development economist Adrian Stokes while speaking on the attainability of Vision 2030. This means not just training but retaining professionals in the proportion needed to fuel national development, while recognising the need for and the value of some migration.

In a recent newspaper article, titled ‘Jamaica’s diminishing endowments’, Neil Richards, an architect and town planner, also connected weak human capital with persistent degradation of the built and natural environment. He argued that paradise is not yet irredeemably lost, but we are getting close.

I agree.

Regaining some advantage requires nimble, mature leadership. It must know the difference between the minutiae and the big picture, and doing more than posturing and pussyfooting.

Grace Virtue, PhD, is a Jamaican residing in Maryland, USA.