Head of the Jamaica Association of Principals of Secondary Schools (JAPSS), Anniona Jones, is urging parents to carefully consider requests to transfer their children to other high schools following the Primary Exit Profile (PEP) placement process, warning that such decisions should be based on what is best for the child’s development rather than the perceived prestige of an institution. Jones also cautioned school administrators against accepting an influx of transfer students primarily for financial gain, arguing that overcrowding can undermine the quality of education and place unnecessary strain on teachers and school resources. She said she is aware that some schools have received 60 or more transfer requests and, while she understands that every parent wants the best for their child, not every school is equipped to provide the type of academic intervention some students need.
“We have to be very careful about how we think of some schools as intervention schools or schools for children with low academic aptitudes, because as the children start to do better, people are still not going to want to place their children necessarily in those schools. You have schools that have low levels of enrolment, and then you have other schools that are bursting at the seams. “It becomes an issue, though, for school governance to be able to say to a principal and have that conversation at the board level that, ‘Listen, this school was built for X amount.’ I still don’t know why we have schools on [the] shift [system] when we have so many schools that are underpopulated.
“It’s really...a policy issue, but a board can make a decision that we are going to limit our school sizes to no more than 22 to 30 children per class,” she told the Jamaica Observer. Jones argued that limiting class sizes is particularly important for schools offering science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) subjects, which she said are best taught in smaller classes. She added that smaller class sizes would also ease the burden on teachers by reducing the volume of books to be marked and allowing more targeted feedback and individual attention for students.
She noted that, in many cases, schools are reluctant to reduce enrolment because funding is largely allocated on a per-student basis, making lower student numbers financially disadvantageous. However, she welcomed the Government’s mo…
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