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CCNTV6
  • 2 years ago
Cabinet has approved an arrangement between the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of National Security which sees expelled students being handed over to Milat.
Transcript
00:00 The Ministry of Education has enlisted the services of MILAT to receive students who
00:05 have exhausted the school discipline matrix and have been expelled.
00:10 We have adopted a no tolerance approach to violence in our schools and our school discipline
00:16 matrix speaks to that. And it's not only punitive but as I have said we have hired staff, additional
00:23 staff to help with the transformative nature of our school discipline. However, we have
00:31 provisions in the law as well as in the discipline matrix to deal with students who despite our
00:37 best efforts are not transforming.
00:40 Cabinet, according to Education Minister Dr. Nian Gadsby-Dorley at a briefing at Education
00:46 Towers today, had taken the decision to prevent locking out students from progressing if they
00:52 are expelled.
00:54 So for students that have to be removed from our school system, students who have to be
00:59 expelled after all efforts have been made, we have already approved compulsory registration
01:07 into MILAT for such students and we do as the Ministry of Education reach out to the
01:11 Ministry of Youth Development on an individual basis informing them of students that require
01:17 their attention in this regard. We also reach out to the Ministry of Social Development
01:22 and the Ministry of National Security informing them that these students have been expelled
01:27 and require their assistance in terms of family counselling, in terms of any attention they
01:33 can give and exposure to programs available from the government.
01:38 According to the law, she says, children under the age of 16 must be enrolled in school,
01:44 which means only those expelled under 16 years of age can be mandated to enlist in MILAT.
01:52 Many of the students that we are speaking about are either 16 or over 16. What you tend
01:57 to see in terms of the pattern of misbehaviour, it gets very strong in Form 3. A lot of students,
02:04 by the time they reach Form 3, they are 16 and that also has impact on school dropouts
02:09 because they reach a compulsory age and they make a decision to leave and the state cannot
02:14 force them at that time to stay in.
02:18 Despite almost daily videos of school fights, some armed and the recent expulsion of a female
02:24 student for being verbally abusive to her teacher, Minister Dr Gadsby-Dolley says the
02:29 numbers are minimal. Three students were expelled last year, she says, and just over 10 this
02:36 year.
02:37 MILAT, the military-led academic training program, on its website, calls itself a social
02:44 intervention program designed to help at-risk young men aged 16 to 20 years transform their
02:51 lives and achieve academic success.
02:54 The minister did not say what were the options for female students, though mentioning talks
02:59 with Serval for a similar partnership. During the briefing, she announced Cabinet's approval
03:05 of comprehensive emergency and completion works to be done on several schools. Comprehensive
03:11 repairs will be done on 27 schools.
03:14 We have just approved today at Cabinet 15 more schools that are going to receive this
03:21 comprehensive repair program and that is at a cost of $236 million. So that carries us
03:28 to a total of 42 secondary schools where we are going to expend $411 million. 27 are ongoing
03:38 and we have just approved today 15 more at a cost of $236 million.
03:44 Emergency works, she explains, are those which, if not done, can result in the closure of
03:50 schools.
03:51 In this fiscal, we are predicting another $300 million to be spent and this is the minimum
03:57 figure that will be spent in emergency work at our schools. And I refer to sewer, plumbing,
04:03 electrical, spalling concrete. These are the kinds of emergencies that we see coming through
04:08 on a daily basis that we must deal with or else our schools can close.
04:15 And of the 100 contracts signed between 2010 and 2015 for the construction of schools,
04:21 she says 50 require completion works.
04:24 Of these schools, we have completed 13 at a cost of $400 million. We are now completing
04:30 seven and that's ongoing. We are expecting to open at least four of these schools by
04:35 the end of this calendar year.
04:37 A total of $1.1 billion, Dr. Gadsby-Dalhi says, has been expended since 2021 on school
04:45 infrastructural works.
04:47 Urvashi Tewari, Rupner Rai, TV6 News.
04:49 [BLANK_AUDIO]
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