Education should be more than a trip down an academic highway

Fri, Jun 8. 2012

Editor: I thought that my work on this history was over, however, based on some responses I received I would just like to add this bit.{{more}}

I was surprised that I did not receive much comment from my peers. Three of my BGS peers wrote thanking me for the memories. Some received the articles second hand so I am thrilled that a few thought the articles were worth sharing. Perhaps my peers do not read Searchlight, or perhaps they are just not interested in this history. My thanks to those who contacted me and to those who were sharing my writing with others.

I received a comment from a younger alumnus who pointed out that the school tie was at one time phased out and then phased in again, so there has been some tinkering with the School uniform – at least how it is worn. He also commented that the country boys now have access to many late vans so that they could stay back and participate in after school activities. One person told me that my articles were being discussed on radio in SVG and that Julian Francis was commenting favourably. Thanks Julian (my cousin), I hope that I provided some food for thought in the government circles.

Someone who went to BGS a few years ahead of me wrote to agree that the school atmosphere was stifling. He finished his schooling at the Grenada Boys Secondary School (GBSS) and found the atmosphere there more relaxing and less threatening. He also reported that at GBSS, there was a dormitory on campus where the country boys who had no place to stay could board and so were part of the wider school. Well done GBSS and thanks for sharing the comparison between schools.

One of my teachers wrote congratulating me for my effort and agreed with my assessment of the school atmosphere. Like many junior masters he was a BGS alumnus

and he indicated that he took great pains to ensure that he did not relate to his students in the same overbearing manner he experience during his student years. I admired his teaching skills, I held him in great esteem rather than feared him and I still respect him to this day.

I also had complimentary notes from alumni of the Girls’ High School including one from my Geography class. They thanked me for bringing back so many memories and one thanked me for remembering “Old Robbie”, yes, he was so loved!

Just in case my articles came across as being ungrateful, let me say that I am extremely grateful for the opportunity I had in attending BGS and getting an education. It prepared me for the life that I have enjoyed. My gripe is with the fact that the curriculum had too much of a pure academic focus and the military style atmosphere stifled individual creativity. Yes our destination was Sixth Form and success at the Cambridge A Levels but just as important was the journey to that destination and the journey could have been so different.

In retrospect the BGS was straight from the history pages of the Middle Ages. How could an institution of such esteem, the school that one had to attend, be so backward in its outlook? We had a feudal system. The Headmaster was King and reigned supreme.

His authority was the law. The masters were the Lords, and the Prefect the Knights, and together they complemented the rule of the Headmaster King and meted out punishment akin to the Trial by Ordeal. That left the student body to be the subservient serfs. It was a self serving and self fulfilling system that perpetuated itself generation after generation. Alumni who became masters were sucked into the system and there were never enough willing voices to promote widespread change. When it came to punishment it was the mighty Headmaster against the individual student. The student had not a ghost of a chance. It was hardly a level playing field. It was an undemocratic system because the student body had no voice. There was no Student Council, no Parent/Teacher Association. If there was a School Advisory Body I was not aware of its existence, mandate, or relationship to the student body.

We were stifled in academics to the detriment of other facets of an education system. We learnt by rote and marks were gained by memorizing and regurgitating truisms, history facts and dates. As we went through school we were able to use logic and reasoning to solve problems in maths, physics and chemistry, but even so we still had to learn and regurgitate those facts and figures. The closest I came to apply theory to life situations was in the social aspect of Sixth Form Geography, by understanding and interpreting how many societies related to and were shaped by their environment. All this is an atmosphere where one was constantly on egg shells, looking out for the “lines police” and the “detention and black book brigade” to pounce.

As a student, part of me was suppressed and could not develop to its fullest. I sincerely hope that in our schools today, our children are allowed to be all that they can be. We have to treat the student as an individual and get away from the “one size fits all” approach. We have to give the student choices and opportunities to develop their many talents. We need to give the student body a voice. While the desire may be to get academic credits, there should also be opportunities for those interested in the arts, trades and life skills to flourish and to market those skills. We should all learn some basic life skills. We may have a university degree but can we repair a leaky faucet or change a faulty light switch? Education has to be more than a trip down the academic highway. I sincerely hope that this account may have provided some food for thought.

Oswald Ferreira