The government of Jamaica and by extension the ruling People’s National Party (PNP) through the Minister of Education, the Most Honourable Mrs. Maxine Henry-Wilson, recently took a principled and land marked position. They argued to allow all the current students (May 2004) of the University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, to write their April/May 2004 examinations despite the candidates’ inability to pay their tuition fees. Was the University of the West Indies’ top executives including Mrs. Hall callous, when they contemplated not allowing any student to write any examinations, although the People of Jamaica have paid approximately 80 percent of the candidate’s tuition costs?
Many peoples within our society, when the news was first heard including Wilmot “Mutty” Perkins and Barbara Gloudon condemned such a stance taken by the government. These distinguished individuals have failed to recognize that the economic contributions in advancing the human capital are at least four times the cost of training them. In addition, the bedrock upon which all advanced nations are built is on the quality of the human stock. Hence, this explains why Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados spent more per capita on education than Jamaica. It is therefore, not surprising that those societies have outperformed ours. You may say nonsense. Nevertheless, what have the statistics in regards economic growth and development, of the countries previously stated, show?
Individuals who have condemned the government’s decision clearly do not understand the dynamics at work. Otherwise, they would have requested that more be done for our youth through the medium of education. As Milton Freidman (1955) in an article titled The Role of Government in Education posits that:
“A stable and democratic society is impossible without widespread acceptance of some common set of values and without a minimum degree of literacy and knowledge on the part of most citizens. Education contributes to both. In consequence, the gain from the education of a child accrues not only to the child or to his parents but to other members of the society; the education of my child contributes to other people's welfare by promoting a stable and democratic society. Yet it is not feasible to identify the particular individuals (or families) benefited or the money value of the benefit and so to charge for the services rendered. There is therefore a significant "neighborhood effect."
Therefore, when the University schools a pupil for any period, for example one year, he/she would have paid 20 percent of the economic cost for the training, and the benefits extend beyond the recipient and his/her family. Meaning, the peoples of Jamaica including the condemners would have gained from the process. Milton Friedman an economist would have undoubtedly studied the economic contributions of education and as such, he would have formed an opinion by the guiding principles of the result. Friedman’s stance was structured within the results of his research and therefore explains the statement “A stable and democratic society is impossible without widespread acceptance of some common set of values and without a minimum degree of literacy and knowledge on the part of most citizens”.
One should understand that the ultimate aim of schooling is not so much so to attend the institution but to complete the offered programme. Hence, when an individual is barred from writing any examination, who benefits? The statistics revealed that less than 10 percent of Jamaica’s human population (2, 607, 332 – STATIN, 2001) is enrolled in tertiary education; hence, are the socially privileged people within our society proposing that less students be trained at the tertiary level. To be educated only at the primary and-or secondary level is highly unacceptable in today’s high-tech global society: Is it that we are proposing that more and more of our technical and top end jobs be offered to foreigner nationals?
Despite the position previously stated, the government’s failure to adequately put a closure to the tuition fee crisis of countless students at the University shows its contempt for the peoples of this society. In that we have elected them just for them to mediate against our cause but for the already privileged middle/upper classes. Once again, the government has failed to deliver on its promise.
Today, many students at the University of the West Indies are irate. What is their “next move”? I presume the answer lies in the phrase “I have a dream”. Moreover, this is all the disadvantage should have to do within the new social order of this post slavery society. I am forwarded the position that to dream is better than not to have dreamt at all. Right!
Is there ever going to be an election again in Jamaica? For we say, our indexed finger is ready to mark that letter which counts. Can an undergraduate student vote in the next general elections? What? “For we shall speak!”
All the undergraduate students at the University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, who wrote the April/May 2004 examinations without paying their tuition, will be barred from writing any future examinations at the institution unless they have fully settled their indebtedness with the company. What are the UWI students to do – just dream, I suppose? Why not? Yes!
A student who has one course to complete the degree requirement and who would have liked to write this examination in July 2004 was told that he/she was unable to do so. As the University’s top executives have rightly decided to bar all the non-paid students from registering for further courses unless they have paid their tuition. However, if a student is unable to pay $12,000 for three credits, then would he/she will be able to complete the programme when the cost will be in excess of $12,000.
In recent times, remittances constitute a larger share of Jamaica’s foreign exchange earnings than in the traditional sectors such as agriculture and bauxite and even that of tourism. Let me inform all Jamaicans, that remittances have outstripped the economic contributions of all other sectors and now can be classified as a sector by itself. Within this reality, is the human element too insignificant for others to pay any attention? In those remittance dollars, the human resource of tertiary level graduants continues to play a significant part. It appears as though critics are not aware that countries such as India manufacture information technology (IT) graduants for the international markets, and that they are reaping the economic benefits therefrom. Is it that, we are caught in the rapture of tradition? If this is the case, then this country is condemned for eternity.
Are the condemners and the government implying that all University students, because of the economic hardship, relinquish their dream? Is the economy unable to offer any further training in human development?
I am proposing that the inability of the police to arrest organized criminality is entirely related to the number of intellectual dropouts at various levels of the educational system. If the government and the PNP want to arrest criminality, then they need to adequately address the decay of the nation’s human capital. The honest and law-abiding citizens of this country do believe in the power of education and the price of struggle, however; we are in need of assistance.
In closing, these questions are for all the University top executives and government ministers: Should my friends and I being honour students relinquish our dreams of being in the academia class because we ‘came’ from humble beginnings? Should we join the criminal elements of our society? Should we open applications for any gang that wants individuals with economics, mathematics, sociology and law backgrounds? The government has done it again – failed by neglect.
Paul Andrew Bourne, MSc. (candidates), BSc. (Hons). , Dip. Edu.
7 F Cambridge Street
Franklin Town
Kingston 16