By Lynford Simpson and Robert Hart, Staff Reporters
Henry-Wilson
DESPITE LAST-MINUTE appeals from Government officials, the island's more than 20,000 teachers have stuck to their threat to boycott classrooms today, disrupting the lives of more than half-a-million students in hundreds of schools across the island.
Reports reaching The Gleaner are that many parents were up to last night scrambling to make eleventh-hour arrangements for the safety of their children who would otherwise be in school today.
The decision of the island's teachers to proceed with industrial action as a show of protest against Government's latest salary offer of six per cent over two years comes despite an earnest plea last night from the Minister of Education, Youth and Culture, Maxine Henry-Wilson, for good sense to prevail. She made the plea in a televised broadcast.
Hers is not the only appeal to have gone unheeded. Last Friday, Senator Noel Monteith, Minister of State for Education, in a statement in the Senate, urged the teachers to reconsider their threat of industrial action.
But, the Jamaica Teachers Association (JTA), the umbrella group representing the island's public teachers, was not in a mood to compromise. Sadie Comrie, president of the JTA, told The Gleaner yesterday that there had been no changes to strike plans. She again urged parents not to send their children to school as no one will be there to supervise them.
"We are asking students not to go out to school tomorrow (today) because teachers will not be in," she said.
With the teachers' protest likely to continue until Wednesday, Mrs. Henry-Wilson said she was particularly concerned about the likely impact on students preparing for GSAT examinations next month and those undertaking school-based projects.
The Minister has asked the teachers to consider the effects of a strike on their students.
"I know that in the past, teachers, even in industrial disputes, you have always made sure to protect the interest of those students whose special programmes may be disrupted," she stated.
"I make a sincere appeal on behalf of those students who will be sitting the GSAT in March and all students whose school-based projects may be endangered in a time of uncertainty," she continued.
The Minister also urged students to remain focused on what they have learned so far, so that "when normality returns, you would not have lost anything".
Although it has had time to put contingencies in place, the scope of the teachers' action, has left the Ministry uncertain as to what to do. The Minister conceded as much last night.
"As we speak there is some uncertainty as to exactly what will prevail in the schools in our country come Monday. However, there is every indication that normal operations will be disrupted," Mrs. Henry-Wilson said. She added that: "The entire Government regrets that we have arrived at this point."
Last night, the Minister told the nation that the Government had put forward the best wage offer it can make. She pointed to a number of items in the wage offer of six per cent spread over two years which was rejected by the JTA membership.
She noted that the cost of the settlement would be substantial at $405 million in the first year, and $645 million in the second year of a two-year contract.
About the six per cent offer, she said: "These are in addition to other benefits for travelling, housing and material, which have been the basis of previous settlements".
She explained that the Government had also agreed to bring the salaries of teachers parallel to the civil service and to move both to within 80 per cent of the market rate.
"This exercise is being conducted with the fullest participation of representatives of the Jamaica Teachers Association who agreed to the consultation and to conduct the exercise with a March timetable for its completion," Mrs. Henry-Wilson said.
However, on Friday JTA secretary-general, Dr. Adolph Cameron, charged that there was a "whole heap of muddle about the 80 per cent ...but teachers are not going to wait; they're not fools. They are too riled up now not to take action ..."
The teachers are demanding that their salaries be raised by 30 per cent in year one, and a further 30 per cent in year two of the 2002-2004 contract period.
