Each year, the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) and other examination bodies and ministries of education in the region announce CXC results in the same format: (1) the number of public and private candidates who took the examinations in the country or school concerned, (2) the gender ratio of students, (3) increases or decreases in overall student performance compared to previous years, (4) the number of students who received full certificates (passes in five subjects), and (5) the rate of pass or fail percentage in relevant subjects such as Mathematics or English. Then there’s the usual fanfare and top scorer photo shoot. For example, this year in Guyana, Ramoll Baboolall led the country, and perhaps the Caribbean, with 27 CSEC subjects (24 First Class and 3 Second Class), while Wotam Heeralall came second with 25 subjects (24 First Class and 1 Class second) . The two boys were from Anna Regina, one of the best schools in Guyana.
What is rarely revealed in these public releases is the increase or decrease in the number and total number of students taking particular courses. For example, an official from Guyana’s Ministry of Education said the pass rate for Caribbean History had dropped from 70.7% to just over 64% last year. What was not stated is how many students in the country took Caribbean History and the percentage of students. Are the humanities and social sciences (for example, history, languages, literature, philosophy, psychology, and the visual and performing arts) declining in schools, colleges, and community universities around the world? How are Indians—an ethnic minority in most diaspora countries—affected by educational trends in subject choice? Could their preferences for subjects leading to careers in medicine, engineering, law, accounting, business and finance work against them, making them ill-prepared to participate in public debate and written communication?
These questions were discussed in a virtual public meeting recently (10/9/22). It was organized by the Indo-Caribbean Cultural Center (ICC) and the Ameena Gafoor Institute (AGI). The four speakers were Professor Hemchand Gossai, a Dean of Liberal Arts at Northern Virginia Community College in the United States; Derek Dabee, a three-term provincial school trustee in Canada, as well as a former chair of the Manitoba Disaster Appeals Board and Founding President of Canadian Caribbean Heart Health Education; Dr. Bhoe Tewarie, a former government minister in Trinidad and Tobago, and former Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of the West Indies (UWI) St. Augustine Campus; and Dr. Tara Singh, a former lecturer in the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Guyana and a former Commonwealth Senior Researcher and Fulbright Scholar.
Professor Hemchand Gossai discussed the etymology of the word “Humanities”. He also noted that education should be a continuous process “to remain unchanged, human stagnation is not a virtue.” Gossai concluded that “The Humanities and Social Sciences ensure that, in fact, we become better as human beings and this should be part of the essence of who we are as educated persons”.
Derek Dabee emphasized the importance of advocacy to encourage inclusive practices in education systems that can help support Indo-Caribbean students as well as other minorities in Canada. He found that Indian music, Filipino music and folk music are taught as well as the use of Indian musical instruments, for example, tabla, harmonium and sitar which are bought by the community.
Dr. Bhoe Tewarie said: “Trinidad and Tobago’s collective national performance, which most would agree is not good, is actually better than the average for the region. Across the Caribbean, about 40% of the CSEC age group (16 years) do not even take the exam and of those who do (60%), over 50% take two subjects or less. This means that 30% of Caribbean 16-year-olds obtain more than two CXC permits. This is a human capital disaster.
“We should not have an education system that is failing our children, when there are schools that are like beacons of light; living and working examples of what to do and how to do it, from which we can easily take cues and make things better school by school. And there are other schools in the country, including some government schools, that perform well and where the climate is conducive to learning and human development.”
Dr. Tara Singh focused mostly on New York City and pointed out that, overall, about four in ten people aged 25 and over in the city have at least one college degree while the comparative rate for the Indo-Caribbean is two in every ten. He noted that while the Indo-Caribbeans have done well economically, they need to do better in higher education in order to gain access to higher paying jobs.
