Yesterday the Teacher’s Union told Minister of Education Francis Fonseca to withdraw the chispas textbooks and send them back to the publisher to be corrected. Well today the man at the head of the largest school management in the country weighed in. Clemente Wade is the general manager of all 123 Catholic public schools. He today told us the mistake in the chispas textbook is one that can be easily corrected. But Wade went further than that, he came out swinging in defense of the free textbook program. He says that the one mistake shouldn’t overshadow what is a good initiative.
Clemente Wade, General Manager – Catholic Public Schools
“I saw a news clip a few evenings ago that spoke about Chispas and the fact that Belize was not put as a separate country and I can understand that. That is I think fairly easy for any publisher to fix if they are asked to fix it. So I don’t see a problem that Chispas wouldn’t be able to be used. The thing is, what I am more worried about is if there were noted mistakes in the social studies book. But not even that I know of because that wasn’t called to my attention either by the media or the union themselves.
But one of the things we should say is this, that those are two books in the whole set of books provided by the Ministry. I don’t think this will slow down the school in anyway because traditionally no school had a complete set of social studies books that they were using before the giving out of free textbooks. That shouldn’t be a hindrance and for Chispas, there were no Spanish series in my schools either. I don’t see it as a major setback even if the books are withdrawn and sent back to the companies to be corrected."
Keith Swift,
Do you think government went about this the right way, do you think that there were enough consultations with school managers, school teachers, with the union?
Clemente Wade,
“What we are trying to do now is to bring up back this thing that we have been dwelling on and we are overshadowing the basic good that a set of textbooks in every school in the country will do. And I keep saying that whenever I have any kind of interviews. We need exactly what happened: a good set of textbooks in all the schools in the country.”
Keith Swift,
Do you feel that this set chosen is a good set?
Clemente Wade,
“This set chosen is a fairly decent set of textbooks and moreover, it is free.”
Keith Swift,
Don’t you think that if there were proper consultations, that a mistake like in the Chispas wouldn’t have popped up?
Clemente Wade,
“Listen to me, again we are re-dredging the past. Hindsight is always 20/20. Yes, maybe there is some thing wrong with Chispas and the social studies book. They were not textbooks that were originally used anyway in any schools. Schools used to use a number of reference books to teach social studies and a number of good reference books to teach Spanish also.”
Keith Swift,
There are 123 Catholic public schools. Will the books be used in those schools?
Clemente Wade,
“Yes and that’s exactly what I am trying to say.”
Wade says the Ministry of Education and the union will ultimately decide if the books will be used with the mistake or if they will be sent back. Wade manages 123 schools which have an enrollment of about 35,000 students. That’s half of the 64 thousand primary school students in the country.
