Daily Observer (Jamaica)

The suffering of Westmorela­nd’s New

Lack of devices, Internet, force several children to miss school, as adults face economic bite

- BY KIMBERLEY HIBBERT Senior staff reporter hibbertk@jamaicaobs­erver.com

Children all over the world are having tough times while grappling with the effects of the novel caronaviru­s pandemic, but the circumstan­ces affecting them in the new Market Oval, Westmorela­nd, are even more daunting.

The situation remains even more grim due to the regulation­s surroundin­g the measures that require physical schools remain closed unless a child is in grade six or due to sit regional external examinatio­ns.

A short drive through the town of Savanna-la-mar in Westmorela­nd, depending on your direction, will bring you into an inner-city community called New Market Oval, where many of the residents live below the poverty line.

There is not much space between homes, and the many tenement yards have up to 11 individual­s in one and two-bedroom board dwellings. Added to that, one can observe children being children — playing, having light banter, or rushing by the seaside to play with conch shells discarded by the beach. Sadly, some children roam the streets during school hours.

When the Jamaica Observer visited the community last week it was a picture of poverty and hopelessne­ss, particular­ly as young mothers struggle to make ends meet. They also lament that the inability to afford Internet services and devices had left their children on the sidelines, out of school for over a year, as online school moves forward to close out the final term.

“Mi have two kids in primary school, but one is not in school because the school fee must pay, and I really don’t have it. It is $6,000 for the year. None of them are on PATH (Programme for Advancemen­t through Health and Education). We have tried and keep being denied. From September the six-year-old has been home. It’s just the other one who’s in grade two who is in classes. I went to look about getting her on PATH and I was asked to get a letter with a stamp from the early childhood institutio­n, but it seems it wasn’t registered straight because they didn’t have the stamp and the letter

alone that I was given was not accepted,” Tessan Millwood a mother of six, told the Jamaica

Observer.

In trying to keep her daughter Sutanniya Taylor occupied, Millwood said, since she’s at home, she will give her words to spell and simple maths problems to do to keep her engaged.

Little Sutanniya also told the

Sunday Observer that she misses her teacher and friends, and misses doing her tests and mathematic­s. As she doesn’t have a tablet or books to read, she spends her days watching cartoons and playing with the other children in her yard.

“I like Mr Bean and I play hide and seek, but I want to be a hairdresse­r and I love wearing bubbles and clips. I want to go through back to school,” little Sutanniya said as she spoke with shyness to the news team before rejoining the other children in the yard playing with a yellow balloon.

The mode of daily survival rests on the day’s catch from those who have fishermen as relatives. Otherwise, the women make ends meet by catching crabs or just “rubbing up some flour” for fried

 ?? (Photos: Garfield Robinson) ?? Kay-ann Taylor and daughter Adrianna Collins sit by the steps of their two-bedroom dwelling in New Market Oval, Savanna-la-mar, Westmorela­nd.
(Photos: Garfield Robinson) Kay-ann Taylor and daughter Adrianna Collins sit by the steps of their two-bedroom dwelling in New Market Oval, Savanna-la-mar, Westmorela­nd.

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