Winning a GOAL scholarship one must be assured of winning a suitable...
Are these the performers to be upgraded? But for those who know not better there is also the curious category of ‘Other Technical & Craft Skilled’ which includes, certainly on the face of it, some interesting contradictions:
The above, however, is a very minimal indicator of the need for a most comprehensive job evaluation exercise – one repeatedly recommended, including in the Commission of Inquiry Report into the Public Service of 2016. For obviously, attention needs to be given to the levels of pay in a promised prosperous economy.
But perhaps the more demanding need is for a very fundamental restructuring of the Teaching Service Commission, conceived in colonial times and which remains constipated in the grading and evaluation of teachers’ compensation at all levels. How the existence of 28 salary scales could be justified when, for starters, the first two grades, TSI (A) and TSI (B), have Minimum and Maximum exactly the same - $66,844 monthly in 2019? Meanwhile the highest Grade is described as SPECIAL and suffers the same constipation of the Maximum being the same as the Minimum - $301,085. What a future to look forward towards retirement! The creative politicians have never noticed over the past two decades, that they (and children) were taught by these devoted servants.
But none of the foregoing is new, except for the pandemic dimensions that demand commitment to change – a fact obviously recognised by the creative designers of an ambitious developmental programme. It does not mean however that ingenuity would not be further tested in the formulation of a variety of contracts not only with respect to various scholarship levels and periods, but, more incisively, the conditions of employment by differing public sector institutions, occasionally confused by the fact that some scholarship winners would have been previously employed somewhere.
It therefore would never be too premature to require those agencies to predict their future technical and managerial needs. For in addition to winning a scholarship you must be assured of winning a suitable job. All the above must be climaxed with the reintroduction of a comprehensive performance appraisal system in order to measure the return on investment. But in the final analysis none of this hullabaloo is worth discussion if candidates like Lisa Budhu of Black Bush Polder cannot access online connection.
Sincerely,
E.B. John