Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand has said “large benefits” will be coming to teachers once Budget 2022 passes. According to Minister Manickchand, “the budget is usually not just only salaries and benefits, but how we deliver resources and how we help to train and retrain our teachers and how we guide that process, would be large benefits that teachers can look forward to.”
Funds from Budget 2022, according to the Minister will also ensure that every primary school student is provided with a wide range of textbooks, written by both local and international authors.
The Minister was keen to note that despite historic disruptions to the education sector, mainly brought on by the Covid19 pandemic, enormous strides have been made. Minister Manickchand state that “this year, we graduated the highest number of students ever from the Cyril Potter College of Education (CPCE) and that sounds like a small feat, but in August of 2020, the college was closed with no prospect or real plan of reopening in the pandemic”.
She further went on to note that, “and if we had not made serious efforts not only to reopen, but to be accessible online and otherwise…then we would not have been graduating any child, let alone the largest batch.”
With ongoing tensions between the Guyana Teachers Union and the Ministry of Education, Minister Manickchand was keen to note that her Ministry has crafted a strategic plan to ensure the safety of teachers and students.
Minister Manickchand noted that, “we are moving forward, not only blindly back into the classroom, but with a better understanding that different things that have not been introduced before, can deliver quality education effectively…it won’t be a complete abandonment of all that we learned in terms of how to use and how to use effective technology to deliver (education).”
Finally, Minister Manickchand stated that she remains committed to improving access to education and that transportation and other such services are in the works.
