PRINCIPAL of Yallahs High School in St Thomas Mark Malabver has said he is optimistic that the installation of cameras inside classrooms at the institution will bring about great results in curbing behavioural problems among his students.

The cameras are courtesy of the Ministry of Education, which has spent well over a billion to roll out cameras in several schools across the island.

While he noted that the behaviour of the students has improved tremendously from 2016 to present, challenges still exist.

“These are not the most disciplined of students and that is why you need somebody to guide them and counsel them at all times. I have been principal since December 2016 and I inherited a student indiscipline problem. We have done various interventions and we also took a very hard nose approach to student indiscipline and there has been significant improvement,” Malabver told the Jamaica Observer.

The principal, who is president-elect of the Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA), said that the number of fights and bad behaviour among students have decreased since the implementation of special programmes, and is expecting things to get better with the initiative to place cameras inside classrooms.

“Grade seven to nine accounts for the larger chunk of certain types of behaviours. A number of classrooms this year will have cameras. I can stay in my office and see what is happening particularly in the grade seven to nine classrooms. As it is now, grade eight and nine are covered and we will be moving to grade seven within the next couple of months. We will then branch out to grades 10 and 11. We will monitor inside the classes and these cameras have voice recordings so we can see and hear what is happening in the various classes,” he said.

Malabver pointed to the importance of having a full complement of teachers at school and shared that that is an area the school currently has a challenge with, being short of about six teachers and a guidance counsellor.

“One of the challenges that we may have is that we won’t get to man all the classes unless we do some mergers and utilise technology. I am mindful that we have to ensure all the classes are manned because an unattended child is like putting a gun in the hands of a madman. Those are the realities we have to contend with.”