Education Finance Reform to prop up low enrollment

Three out of every five students do not complete high school, that’s a high and damning percentage of young persons who have fallen from the wayside. Studies show that the number of youths out of school is contributing to the lawlessness on the streets. This morning, the Ministry of Education, launched an initiative that attempts to remove the barriers that keep the students away from the classrooms. News Five’s Isani Cayetano reports.

Isani Cayetano, Reporting

The correlation of crime and violence and the dropout rate of students enrolled in secondary schools has long been the focus of studies conducted by various government agencies including the Ministry of Education.  To every five students of high school age there are three who do not complete the required curricula.  That ratio has been carefully examined within the context of the ever-increasing crime situation.  In an effort to address the problem the ministry is introducing the Education Finance Reform, a new initiative that will respond to dropout and low enrollment.

patrick faber

Patrick Faber, Minister of Education

“The new method of financing will therefore provide key incentives to schools.  It will provide incentives to be more efficient, to reduce unnecessary expenditure, to reduce repetition and dropout thus ensuring that we get more value for our money and thus ensuring that more of our young people get an education.”

It is a proposal that was tabled over ten years ago to deal with inequities within the current secondary education system.  In 2004, the Belize Association of Principals offered its suggestion for reform but change wouldn’t come until 2010, two years into the tenure of the current administration.

Brenda Armstrong, Principal, Wesley College

“The Education Sector Reform is not quite just a reduction in the cost.  There is an attempt in this reform structure to at least try to more equitably use the public funds so that more students can benefit from a secondary education.  So, to my mind, the average student who leaves standard six that perhaps would not have had the full cost to register or to pay the monthly fees that currently are charged by secondary schools might get an improved or a more high probability of making it into a high school.”

For years students attending schools in Belize City have received more public funding than those in rural areas.  The uneven distribution forced families in poor or rural communities to struggle with the high cost of education.  The disparity has allowed students in urban areas more options and access to education.

Christopher aird

Christopher Aird, Chief Education Officer

“In our thinking we should start, I think, from a good general education base and then first, not to say that a range of choice is not a good thing but if we have forty percent of our children with a wide range of choices and sixty plus percent of our children with no choice at all, not even access to secondary education then we ought to think about how we are spending and for whose benefit.”

The implementation of new policies should come into effect as of November but it leaves many to wonder whether the Education Finance Reform will only last as long as the current government remains in office.

Brenda Armstrong

Brenda Armstrong

“The initiative to make some changes in the way government finances secondary ed. predates this government.  In fact it goes back to early 2000 and at that time the previous government was in power.  I am sure that if the ministry is committed in its allocation of funds to education which the Ministry of Finance has ensured over the years there shouldn’t be any question of its sustainability.  We pay taxes and these monies come from the public purse.  As history would show we have been putting into education some twenty-seven percent of our national budget.”

That percentage, according to Minister of Education, Patrick Faber, is well over a hundred million dollars per annum.  With the reform policy in place many schools are expected to receive higher funding as the new financing method aims to distribute monies equitably with additional grants for students with academic or socioeconomic difficulties. Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.