OMG Digital Magazine OMG Issue 276 14th September 2017 | Page 38

OMG Digital Magazine | 276 | Thursday 14 September 2017 • PAGE 38 AGREEMENT: THA Chief Secretary Kelvin Charles, left, talks with WASA representatives, Assistant to the Chairman Raquel Brown, right, and Executive Secretary to the CEO Meiling Wong, after the signing of a Memorandum of Agreement for a waste water treatment plant in southwest Tobago that will serve roughly 20,000 Tobagonians. ASSESSMENT FOR UNDERPERFORMERS THUMBS UP FOR REPAIRS Students in Tobago returned to school on Monday (September 4) without any major hiccups, with repairs during the July/August vacation period completed on time. Chief Secretary Kelvin Charles, who is also Secretary of Education, Innovation and Energy, is pleased with the repairs he saw during a surprise visit. “It was designed to see for myself what is happening at the schools, to get an idea because it was unannounced so I wanted to see the school in its glory. I didn’t want a situation where people knew I was coming so they planned,” he said. The visit also allowed for an evaluation of the repairs, and assessment of the contractors. Charles highlighted one major issue. “It’s on target,” he said. “The concern I have, however, has to do not with the school per se but with the level of vandalism that seems to be taking place. As you would have seen for yourself, all the light fixtures, the perimeter of the school were destroyed.” Charles urged parents and teachers to encourage students to take better care of school property. On Tuesday, the Chief Secretary visited schools in east Tobago. A revised curriculum is being created for students who scored below 30 per cent at this year’s S.E.A exams. Chief Secretary Kelvin Charles said an outline has been done for the curriculum and a student assessment must also be completed. “Along with the psycho-social assessments would be the assessments would be the assessments of those students who are to be placed or who have been placed at the various schools,” he said.’ Charles said programmes can then be devised to help these students improve. “I expect that the teachers in those schools, along with the curriculum officers in the Division of Education, Innovation, and Energy, would then create the necessary programmes that would allow [the students to move] to where you would like to take them.”