Parents of Combermere students desire answers

The parents of Combermere students want answers.

 

They made this abundantly clear on Saturday evening as they passionately voiced their concerns during a three-hour long special meeting of the Combermere School’s Parent Teachers’ Association and the Old Scholars’ Association, called to address last Tuesday’s closure of the Waterford campus after students and teachers continued to complain of feeling ill.

 

While meeting at Harrison College the parents were visibly annoyed that Principal Vere Parris was a no-show and that no other member of the school’s management or representative from the Ministry of Education were in attendance.

 

However, they proceeded to make it clear to the PTA executive that they want the Ministry to make available the report carried out on the issues at the school. They also called for better communication and the need to find a temporary location for the students. In fact, some parents said they believed the issue at Combermere is beyond environmental and has to do with a fractured relationship between staff and the principal.

 

President of the Barbados Secondary Teachers’ Union (BSTU), Mary Redman told parents that from week one this semester, she received reports from teachers about problems.

 

“...There was a strong smell of faeces and teachers and students started to feel sick,” she disclosed.

 

“Therefore, if you have a situation where as an administrator, you know that students and staff are again falling ill in an environment that was sick just the year before, what measures were put in place? What reports were made to the ministry in relation to that? So that proactive action could have been put in place so we wouldn’t be in this situation today.”

 

“Therefore, if the persons who are supposed to be doing what they are supposed to be doing [were doing it] correctly, all of the arrangements would have already been made to relocate your children in the interim as the ministry carries out the ‘extensive investigations’ that there are supposed to carry out.”

 

According to the BSTU President, within the last two weeks there were several reports made, because as teachers and students fall ill, the Ministry asked that they complete a form.

 

“And of the forms I was able to collect, 15 students had actually written out reports of falling ill and then they were 11 teachers. The environment is sick,” stressed Redman, who is also a Combermere old scholar.

 

“I am not saying that Combermere needs to be closed down because I am not in a position to say that…All I can say to you is that your children, for their safety, cannot to be there now while we do not know what the problem is. Get behind the Ministry and get the report.”

It was however old scholar, Alex McDonald who put forward a motion that the meeting nominate and select a six-member committee to assist the PTA to liaise with the Ministry of Education to deal with this matter.

 

He said the committee should consist of old scholars and parents.

 

“You don’t know what the problems are yet, so how are you going to talk about moving the students and all that other stuff…,” McDonald pointed out.

 

“To get to the root with the assistance of that committee. They have to make sure that within a week you have that meeting with the Ministry to find out the problem … The mandate of those six persons is to liaise with the PTA, having gotten your feedback to insist on a full account of the problem at Combermere school and to report back to you… If that committee is unable to meet with the Ministry between then and now, then we will have to join hands around that Ministry. Remember that there are only few days until November 30th. Nobody wants to see signs outside the Ministry.”

 

All present were in favour of the committee, which includes Economist, Jeremy Stephen; Philip Nicholls, Attorney-at-law; Leona Deane, Sanitation Service Authority Engineer; Mark Owen, Surveyor and Alex McDonald, the former Chairman of the Barbados Private Sector Association. (TL)