Schools across Guyana will soon undergo comprehensive evaluations and receive report cards measuring their overall performance, with the results made public. In a promo clip released on Thursday ahead of the full airing of the Starting Point Podcast, Minister of Education Sonia Parag said the initiative is part of a broader push to strengthen accountability and drive improvements across the school system.
Minister Parag was keen to highlight the significant investments made by the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) government in the past five years to expand and modernise school infrastructure, increase capacity building opportunities for teachers, and increase access to learning materials and financial resources. She said these investments must translate into stronger student outcomes.
She emphasised that the education sector must continue to evolve under her watch; as such, the Ministry of Education is employing new methods to ensure schools perform and are held accountable. She was pleased to share that this is the first time schools will receive such performance reports, adding that it could be implemented as early as this year, following the completion of the National Grade Six Assessment (NGSA).
“We have to look at moving these schools from one stage to the next. You have A-list schools, you have B-list schools, you have national schools, and so we have to look at how these schools perform. Of course, a report card for the schools would be different from a report card for the individual students, but we are working on what that would look like,” Minister Parag noted.
She further noted that school report cards could even serve as a means of encouraging schools to face their shortcomings and take decisive action for meaningful improvement.
“When you’re evaluating performance, another school might say, well, this school is doing well, I am going to try to get to that point. It is, therefore, an incentive to improve, and it’s an encouragement, I’ll say, to improve, and so we are going to introduce that,” she noted.
According to the Education Minister, the aim is to ensure that parents have a better understanding of school performance based on several variables. The goal is to move beyond evaluating schools based on the achievements of high-performing students or teachers. Instead, a range of other factors that contribute to the overall effectiveness of educational institutions will be assessed, and the appropriate rankings applied.
Overall, Minister Parag said students deserve to be in an environment that is constantly improving to ensure they are prepared for their future roles in Guyana’s national development and the wider world.
“I can’t be sitting at the helm of this sector, and we are lagging. We have to look at all areas and how we can improve in those areas,” the minister concluded.