Agricultural Education and Work Experience Programmes in Schools in a Third World Country: What Prospects for Human Resources Development? Author(s): Zellynne Jennings-Wray Source: Comparative Education, Vol. 18, No. 3 (1982), pp. 281-292 Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3098795 Accessed: 31-03-2016 10:11 UTC REFERENCES Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3098795?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#references_tab_contents You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms
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Comparative Education Volume 18 No. 3 1982 281
Agricultural Education and Work Experience Programmes in Schools in a Third World Country: what prospects for human resources development? ZELLYNNE JENNINGS-WRAY
The rejection of the Western concept of an educated man and instead the vocationalisation or diversification of education in order to produce "people with a training at once general and technical, that is to say men who have acquired technical skill in a specific field and are able to
apply it and make it relevant to the objectives peculiar to evolving societies" [1] has been seen as a key solution to educational problems in Third World countries. But as Hurst says fortunately or unfortunately attempts to do this have rarely been highly successful,
for one reason because parents, teachers and pupils have often combined to resist what they perceive to be a second-class form of education, shutting doors to jobs which remain open to those who receive an academic form. [2] This is a crucial point because it strikes at what is fundamental to attempts to effect changes
in Third World educational systems through the initiation of innovations-namely, people's attitudes and values as revealed in how they perceive such innovations. Studies on acceptance of innovations have shown that people are not likely to accept an innovation that is perceived as not being relevant to their needs and interests, incompatible with their values or too complex for them to manage [3]. Bacchus [4], for example, has shown how attempts to introduce innovations at the primary level of the Guyanese educational system were thwarted by conflicts in interest between the ruling groups and the masses. Between the 1830s to the 1960s, he wrote,
the ruling groups attempted to impose on the masses their views about what should be the appropriate content of the primary school curriculum, while the latter indicated their opposition to such content by their lack of interest in practical subjects and their continuing preference for academic ones. Similar conflicts of interest were reported in relation to the secondary level where curricular reforms were aimed at influencing occupational choices in the technical and agricultural fields [5]. It was a clear case that these students and their parents did not see such programmes as providing them access to better paid and more prestigious jobs. They wanted the 'irrelevant' Western-type academic curriculum which, in their view, afforded them the route to economic mobility and security. To combat such conflicts in interest and stem the failure of curricular reforms, Bacchus [6]
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sees the need for "more profound social and economic changes", and a "radical rethinking and reform of the existing educational policies and priorities" in Third World countries. By examining some fairly recent developments in relation to agricultural education and Work Experience Programmes in Secondary Schools in Jamaica, this paper both questions whether such 'radical rethinking' is needed in existing Jamaican educational policies and priorities and challenges whether the view that the whole future of developing countries like Jamaica is heavily dependent on effective agricultural programmes in schools can any longer be supported. Finally, based on the Jamaican experience I will suggest certain actions that Third World governments could take to facilitate more meaningful educational reform in the short term.
CURRICULAR REFORMS
Radical rethinking and reform in educational policies and priorities have taken place in Jamaica in recent years at all levels of the educational system. At the primary level, for example, there has been a thrust towards an integrated curriculum which is conceived as essentially a child-centred model geared towards meeting the needs and interests of the child. In addition, the model is envisaged as facilitating greater school-community participation. A recent Primary School Project [7] has indicated that these ideals can be realised once the schools have the necessary infrastructural requirements, not least of these being adequate inservice training of teachers. The fact that in spite of this, these primary schools "remain essentially concerned with getting their students into Secondary schools" [8] is not so much symptomatic of these curricular reforms having failed as indicative of the importance attached
to education as a means of social mobility. Primary school teachers begin to prepare pupils
from fourth grade for the Common Entrance Examination (CEE) [9], success at which
guarantees the child a passport to better social and economic prospects because it means for him a place in one of the island's 48 high schools which offer the kind of education that the society values most. Reflective of the 'radical thinking' implicit in Bacchus' paper is the following statement taken from the Five Year Education Plan (1978-83): Educational programmes must include productive work as an integral activity of the school system, in order to: maintain a balance between academic and practical skills in students' growth and development: prepare students for entry to the world of work: impart to students the value of their involvement in economic productivity at the personal, school, community and national levels. [10]
The Jose Marti New Secondary School, a gift from the Cuban government in 1976, is one example of attempts to achieve these ideals. It is the only school of its kind in the island, being
the first all-boarding institution in which the entire school population is involved in a workstudy programme which combines academic and vocational activities, the greater emphasis being on the latter. Agriculture is the only compulsory subject in the school and during the school day-which extends from 5.30 am to 10.00 pm-both students and teachers take it in turn to tend to the Piggery, Dairy, Poultry and Agronomy units. The sale of the products from these units enables the school to become self-sufficient [11]. No systematic evaluation has yet been done to attest to the efficacy (or lack of it) of the Jos6
Marti curriculum. But this is not extraordinary since "educational innovations are almost never evaluated on a systematic basis" [12] thus resulting in many promising ones being abandoned even before they have had a chance to lay roots. Reports have been made in recent times of educational innovations originating from European or American models which, when transferred to the educational systems of Third World Countries, result in failure. Kay [13], for
example, attributed the failure of a child-centred primary education model in Kenyan schools
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Agriculture in Schools in a Third World Country 283 to a conflict between the values embodied in child-centred philosophy and cultural values embedded in Kenyan society. But the more recent case of team teaching in a Teacher Training Institution in Nigeria [14] can hardly be described as having failed, as the writer purports, since it was not given a chance to work in the first place. The innovation strategy described there is typical of the case in the Jamaican educational system in recent years: poor planning,
an inordinate haste to bring about change, lack of consultation of the relevant parties, impulsive action resulting from somebody's 'bright idea' with little or no thought for the implications either in terms of the values cherished by those for whom the innovation is intended or whether the necessary infrastructural requirements are in place. Two innovations
will suffice to demonstrate this.
AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION
Bacchus [6] points out that nearly every British educational commission to the colonies since the 1850s has recommended that agricultural education should be given a central role in the curriculum of schools. In Jamaica, agricultural education in schools has been linked with achieving important "national goals for food production and to increase export commodities both of which are critical to the foreign exchange, unemployment and under-employment, and
improve income distribution" [15]. How have these lofty goals been implemented? Two
hundred and twelve schools are engaged in agricultural education, mostly of the school garden type, but some have tutorial farms and five have commercial farms. This, however, represents only 33% of the island's schools at the first and second levels of the educational system. Presently there are four special schools offering agricultural education, one of which was opened as recently as 1980. At the time of writing this article, there is no tertiary level institution in the island offering agricultural education. Up until September 1981, there had
been one which began in 1910 as The Government Farm School and was renamed the
Jamaica School of Agriculture (JSA) in 1939. Reasons that have been given for the closure of the JSA have ranged from a neglect of its feeder institutions over the past fifteen years to its removal from its location in Kingston where it had close links with the Ministry of Agriculture
to an isolated site some ten miles outside Kingston where a creeping urbanisation of
surrounding areas gradually ate up its land. In addition, the cutting of the training period from three to two years, the lack of qualified staff, a rapid turnover of administrators who seemed
incapable of handling the unionised power of the workers, the neglect of the Institution's buildings and facilities, together with the loss of its commercial farm to the Jose Marti School-which meant that the JSA lost its means to self-sufficiency-appear to have collectively led to the institution becoming inoperable. In a debate in Parliament a member of the Opposition posited that the Minister of Education had no authority under the JSA Act to close
the school as the Act gave the School Board responsibility for the running of the institution.
Within less than three months, this Act was repealed and a short time after what used to be the
JSA became the new home of the Police Training School which had long outgrown its original site at Port Royal. Whatever the real reasons for its closure, it is the treatment of some 115 of its students that has been the centre of the furore over the school. With very little warning these students were
sent to a recently opened Secondary School specialising in agriculture to complete their training. It is outside the scope of this paper to discuss the details of what happened there,
although the public is much in the dark about this since the students were never allowed to tell their side of the story. Suffice it to say that these students were eventually expelled and their
agricultural education came to an untimely end. Their expulsion has raised outcries against
oppression, infringements of human rights and freedoms, particularly in light of the fact that
these students were 'children of the poor' [16]. The plight of the JSA not only shows how
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vulnerable education is at the hands of politicians, but it also has serious implications for agricultural education in Jamaica. Which student at present is seriously going to want to contemplate a career in agriculture when he has no immediate prospects of a post-secondary training? The axing practically overnight of an institution in existence for over forty years is indicative of the low esteem in
which agricultural education is held in Jamaica. Research has shown that agriculture is viewed by secondary level students and teachers as a course for low achievers: yet most agriculture students seek 'white collar jobs' in agriculture or choose careers unrelated to agriculture [17]. An investigation conducted by the writer into the choice of occupations by ninth grade
agriculture students after leaving school revealed that most of the girls wanted to be
dressmakers/designers, nurses, teachers, secretaries and doctors: only one out of 30 selected agriculture as a career. 'It is a good subject for men', written by one girl, sums up the general attitude of the girls towards agriculture as a career. More boys contemplated careers in agriculture but mostly in farm management. A male student writing on 'Why I would choose agriculture as a career' spent most of the essay extolling the value of agriculture as a route to becoming a veterinary surgeon. He wrote: "one of the best advantages is the salary and in our Jamaican society a medical doctor is always well looked upon.., .is classed as one of those
who have made it to the top". Another student wrote: "it [i.e. agriculture] can help you to go to
different countries on farm work", while yet another said: "individuals who have skills in agriculture could migrate and make their living in another country". So much for agricultural education and the achievement of national goals! Negative attitudes towards agriculture have been blamed in measure on the quality of teaching in the schools. In 1978 there were only 130 qualified teachers of agriculture in the school system and many of the schools offering agriculture had no teachers with qualifications
in agriculture [15]. The source for such teachers has dried up with the closure of the JSA. Admittedly, as External Examiner of the Agricultural Education course at the JSA for three years prior to its closure, I discovered that many of the graduates never reached the school room. The very best either joined the Agricultural Extension Services, went into private enterprise or found ways of going abroad to study engineering. But the drift away from the classroom is not peculiar to agriculture teachers. It is a disease eating away at the entire Jamaican educational system. Principals of secondary schools often communicated to me their dissatisfaction with agriculture teachers who seemed inadequately equipped to deal with the practice of agriculture in schools: their courses, they said, were far too theoretical. However, these teachers without doubt encounter a number of circumstances in the schools which force them to make their programmes more theoretical than they would have liked. Not least, one would say, is the attempt to gain academic respectability not only for themselves in the school
but also for the subject. In addition, their efforts are often thwarted by heads of schools who feel that the agriculture department is lowest in the order of priority for resources. Hence many schools suffer from a lack of agricultural tools, farm equipment, fertilisers, and even classroom space for the students of agriculture to do their theoretical work. Inadequate water supply, poor quality of the land, and absence of changing room facilities-which means that students have to do agriculture in their school uniforms-plague the effective operation of agricultural programmes in schools. Perhaps the most serious problem faced by the schools, however, is-that of praedial larceny. There have in fact been incidents where night watchmen have either been seriously injured or shot and killed by larcenists bent on rifling schools' farm products. From what has been said, it must be evident that agricultural education programmes in schools are operating under very serious constraints. Not least of these is the fact that the programmes are being encouraged in certain types of schools only-namely, Technical and New Secondary schools. Many traditional high schools even in rural areas where there is ample land space do not have agricultural programmes. There is no escaping the fact that New
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Agriculture in Schools in a Third World Country 285 Secondary schools are viewed as inferior institutions by the society generally, their curricula
being more practical than academic. These schools have a low social class intake where
previous educational experiences have been in basic or infant schools [18] and government primary schools in which, for the most part, they have been taught under conditions of overcrowding, and inadequate physical, material and human resources [19]. Children from the upper and middle classes who have attended private preparatory schools and those from the government primary schools who have passed the CEE attend the traditional high schools. Since those who attend the New Secondary schools did not pass the CEE a sense of failure, exacerbated by inferior curricular offerings, pervades the life of these students. Different types of certification further segregate the secondary level students [20] with the high school student
gaining qualifications which are not only valued by employers but also equip them for
university matriculation.
Inspite of all the rhetoric about the value of agricultural education programmes for the development of the economies of Third World countries, the reality is that the students and
their parents do not see agriculture as a subject to be studied by anyone with ambition. The 'in
thing' now is Business Education. Most, if not all, of the 140 secondary level institutions in Jamaica are offering courses in Business Education and considerable curriculum development activity is going on presently in that field in the Commonwealth Caribbean, including the initiation of Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) examinations in Principles of Business and Typewriting. The importance attached to Business Education is not only underscored by the ideology of the present Labour government, but it is also evident in the proposed initiation
of a Bachelor's degree in Business Education at the College of Arts, Science and Technology beginning in the summer of 1982, for the first time in the island's history. Research has also shown that Business Education is presently the most satisfactory vocational course both from the point of view of meeting students' needs and interests and meeting labour requirements of
the nation. Needless to say, most schools place their best students in Business Education courses [17]. Is the "whole future of the UDCs... heavily dependent on an effective agricultural education programme in their schools" [6]? Certainly the people who have to do such programmes do not perceive it so. And that is what really matters, given that innovation adoption behaviour is dependent on how the receivers perceive the innovation, regardless of the intrinsic merit of the innovation itself [3]. Agricultural education in most schools in Jamaica is breathing its last. It will take a miracle to make the phoenix rise from its ashes. WORK EXPERIENCE PROGRAMME
One of Bacchus's suggestions for educational reform is the elimination of the full-time secondary education course as it is now offered in most UDCs, and the establishment of a type
of education which forges stronger links between education and productive work. The work experience orientation would involve students doing on-the-job training alongside master craftsmen in their chosen fields. Whether this strategy is the solution to the problems of a country that has one of the highest illiteracy rates in the Caribbean, as well as one of the highest unemployment figures, will not be debated here. There is no doubt, however, that some efforts have been made to link education and productive work more closely. In 1974 the Jamaican government extended the life of the New Secondary Schools by two
years with the introduction of the grade 10-11 programme [21]. An integral part of this further
training is the Work Experience Programme (WEP) which takes the form of grade 11 students
being released for 21 days to get experience in the world of work. These students are placed in
work stations or agencies in both the private and public sectors to sample at first hand a realistic employment situation tied closely to their vocational area of study. The students are not paid but are covered by insurance arranged by the government. Recent research [22, 23] suggests that the WEP has met with a fair measure of success: some students perform so well at
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the work stations that they are employed immediately. However, the WEP labours under a number of constraints which make the objectives of the programme as viewed by the planners
appear overly ambitious. The WEP is envisaged by planners as having benefits not only for the students but also for the school and community. Students are seen as being helped to develop healthy self-concepts, good work ethic, positive relationships with fellow-workers as well as to discover whether their vocational choices were the correct ones. Benefits to the school include not only the use of the
skills and knowledge of qualified members of the community to supplement and enrich vocational instruction, but also the possibility for students to receive training and exposure with equipment and facilities that the schools could not afford. Moreover the programme is seen as enabling employers to participate in curriculum decision-making in schools, thus facilitating curricular responses to their specified needs. Benefits to the community include enabling students to gain the knowledge and skills needed for employment in their own communities, thus bringing school and community closer together [24]. A sample of grade Xl students who had done the WEP reported that whereas they found
that the programme gave them some experience of the world of work, they did not find that it
helped them to develop a healthy self-concept. They were only marginally convinced that the
WEP enabled them to find out whether their vocational choices were correct. This was not
surprising since some 55% of them were unable to find work stations where they could gain experience in their vocational subjects [22]. The fact that only 5% of the managers were aware that students were not gaining work experience in the vocational areas in which they had
specialised in school is an indication of the lack of communication between school and
potential employers. What is more alarming is the apparent lack of communication within the schools themselves because none of the principals or Work Experience teachers felt that an
inability to work in areas related to their vocational choices posed any problems to the students. Teape's study further revealed that whereas the students (and their teachers) felt that employers expected too much of them, none of the employers were aware of this shortcoming.
Moreover, whereas most of the students (and 40% of their teachers) felt that they were not given sufficient supervision at work stations, only 5% of the managers admitted to this. Students living in the rural areas are clearly the most disadvantaged not only on account of there being insufficient work stations in rural areas but also because these students have to travel long distances to these work stations, often on foot because transportation poses serious problems [23]. Financial embarrassment also proved a grave difficulty for both urban and rural students. Perhaps this could be attributed to the fact that although most of the managers
gave students pocket or lunch money they did not feel obliged to do. How positive were the relationships developed between students and their fellow-workers is questionable since many
students complained of having to do menial tasks-such as the cleaning and sweeping of
factories and offices-which their co-workers did not want to do.
A random sampling of grade Xl students who had graduated in 1979 to ascertain how the WEP had benefitted their working lives revealed that of 20 students who responded, only two had obtained jobs both at the same place where they had done WEP [22]. Six students, unable to find employment, were doing further training courses at Technical High Schools and Colleges. The remaining twelve graduates were unemployed, even though amongst them were a number of students who had been rated very highly by both teachers and work station managers. This is perhaps not surprising since in October 1979 the unemployed labour force stood at 299,100 which represented an unemployment rate of 31-1% which was most acute amongst the 14-19 age-range [25]. The Jamaican school leaver who has been prepared for the world of work faces months of job-seeking which in recent years has been well in excess of twelve months.
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Agriculture in Schools in a Third World Country 287 IMPLICATIONS OF THE JAMAICAN EXPERIENCE FOR DEVELOPMENT IN THIRD WORLD COUNTRIES
While one would agree with Bacchus [6] that the key solution to the kinds of problems highlighted in this paper rests fundamentally in "more profound social and economic changes", this realisation is not particularly helpful to the educational planner who has to deal with the here and now. Social and economic changes do not come overnight. While we are waiting for such changes, what are we-who are helping to shape the lives of those on whom the future of our nation will depend-supposed to do?
Democratic Socialism was an ideology that championed profound social and economic changes in Jamaica. Manley saw it as creating a classless society, "... the total implications of... which are nothing less than a social system in which upward and downward mobility are
determined exclusively by individual merit subject only to the right of all to a minimum share"
[26]. The development of greater self-sufficiency through self-help, the full utilisation of available local resources which were geared more directly towards meeting the needs of the less affluent groups in the society, the provision of a basic level of education for the total
population-an objective given prominence in the priority attached to the JAMAL [27]
programme-all of which Bacchus [6] sees as key factors in his new development strategy, were major goals of that ideology. The fate of Democratic Socialism in Jamaica since it took a nose-dive in the General Elections of 1980 need not detain us. Suffice it to say that the Jamaican people are not hearing so much now about the need for a New Economic Order and even seemingly minor yet profound changes that were brought about in that era--changes that
reflected the dignity of the Jamaican as a person, a free agent with the power to shape the course of his life-appear to have been trampled underfoot by a regression to a 'new era' of dependency and conservatism. For example, there has clearly been a backlash against the more casual form of dress, which is more closely identified with the working classes, that was promoted by the way in which members of the former government dressed. Now the sight of Ministers of the new Labour government addressing farmers and other workers in the hot sun in their immaculate threepiece suits and ties, is a subtle message to the working- and lower-class man not only to keep in his place but also to aspire towards those very ideals that educators and economists in the developed world are insisting he should reject. The fact that Jamaica has to solicit funds from the World Bank and other external funding agencies in order to finance innovations into her educational systems raises the question of how far she is free to determine the educational destinies of her people-a question also raised by Thompson [28] in relation to Third World countries generally. Aid never comes without strings, as the recent Caribbean Basin Initiative will in time tell. The fact that the thriving of the Jamaican economy has become so dependent on that of the United States of America further points to the limits on the freedom and power of the
Jamaican people to effect the kind of social and economic changes in their own society which would best meet their needs. What prospects then for local initiatives at educational reform? NEED FOR EMPLOYMENT-GENERATING STRATEGIES
Clearly the major solutions to problems in Jamaica's educational system lies outside the education system itself. Oxtoby [29] has argued rightly that provision of vocationally oriented curricula rooted in the practicalities of the world of work is not the panacea for educational problems in Third World countries. These need to be accompanied by structural changes and
reforms in labour market practices, modification in the pattern of wage rates and the
introduction of specific employment-generating strategies. Table I underscores the importance of this particularly for the 14-19 age-group which has the highest percentage of unemployed. Also significant is the following statement by the Director of Statistics:
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The growing tendency is for the greater portion of the unemployed to be found among the young. At the same time, the educational level of the unemployed is higher than in previous years. Thirty two percent of the unemployed had postprimary education and of these 56% had never worked. [30] TABLE I
Unemployment amongst the 14-19 age-group in Jamaica by sex in April 1981
Age range Both sexes Males Females Total population 26-2 15-1 38-6 14-19
57-1
40-4
78-8
Source: Statistical Review, November 1981 (Department of Statistics, Jamaica, 1982)
NEED FOR GOVERNMENT SUBSIDY AND CENTRALISATION OF PROGRAMMES
It is a misconception for governments of Third World countries to believe that schools can change 'almost overnight' from a state of dependency to one of self-reliance. Caught up in a general economic squeeze, many schools in Jamaica are experiencing severe financial crises. In the face of the escalating cost of education in a country where the slogan, 'free education', did much to sway the populace in a past general election, the frequent complaint from principals of schools is that they have not received their annual subsidy for months and sometimes even years. Schools are, however, made to feel that they should bear with the 'struggle' for selfreliance and find ways of becoming economically self-sufficient. Admittedly, some schools
succeed, especially those with supportive Parent-Teachers's Associations. But those are
amongst the privileged. This call for self-reliance is often taken as an opportunity for the Ministry of Education to 'stay aloof, while individual schools struggle to implement programmes that have been thrust upon them-programmes which are costly both in terms of human and material resources yet ones which are seen as having significance for the economic productivity of the nation. Agricultural programmes in schools are costly. Tools, farm equipment, fertilisers, seeds have
to be bought. But money is not all that is needed. One principal summed up the general opinion of principals of schools with agricultural programmes thus: "much more 'support' is needed from the Ministry of Education in the form of supervision of Agricultural Science teachers, feasibility studies for new crops, funding etc, if agriculture is ever to get off the ground-or rather onto the land!" The WEP is also very costly to the work stations. In her interview of work station managers,
Teape [22] found that they felt that the Ministry of Education should subsidise the WEP in
order to ease the financial burden on the work stations. All the principals, moreover, expressed dissatisfaction at the seeming lack of concern with the WEP on the part of the Ministry. Work
station managers also complained about the students' lack of in-depth knowledge of the practical skills in which they were gaining work experience. This is an outgrowth of the problems facing the vocational education programmes in the schools. These programmes are being crippled by lack of machinery and general equipment. Although many of these schools were originally equipped by World Bank Funds, machinery and equipment have either been vandalised or have fallen into disrepair due to lack of spare parts which have not been obtained on account of the island's foreign exchange problems in recent years. Furthermore,
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Agriculture in Schools in a Third World Country 289 the small cadre of teachers skilled in vocational areas in Jamaica is spread very thinly throughout the system. Hence in any one school one is likely to find students being taught a vocational skill by a teacher who lacks adequate qualifications. Centralisation of vocational programmes could ease this problem. This would involve equipping particular schools with the necessary equipment, staff and other resources for providing specialised training in one or two
vocational subjects. Thus students wishing to study Electrical Installation, for example, would go to the school which has that programme fully operative. NEED FOR EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
In relation to the WEP, the fact that none of the managers felt that too much was expected of
the students at the work stations whereas a large number of both teachers and students did, coupled with the fact that the managers did not seem to realise that they were not providing the necessary supervision suggests a lack of adequate communication between the schools and
potential employers. This is in fact the responsibility of the Work Experience teachers, namely, to coordinate the total operation and functioning of the WEP and act as the vital link between the school and the work community. Such a heavy responsibility suggests the need for Teacher
Education Colleges to institute specialised programmes to equip these teachers with the
necessary skills and expertise. There is, furthermore, a need for public education with regard to the worth and working of the WEP and agricultural education programmes in schools. Media could be more effectively used not only to combat negative attitudes towards practical and manual work in schools (and in the society at large) but also to get employers to accept new types of certification. The average graduate of the New Secondary School obtains a Secondary School Certificate which employers consider inferior to the General Certificate of Education (GCE) and would give employment to the holder of the latter in preference to the former. An unwillingness to accept or a suspicion of new types of certification amongst employers is not a phenomenon peculiar to Jamaica since Mmari [31] pinpoints similar problems in Tanzania.
RATIONALISING SECONDARY SCHOOL CURRICULA: COUNTERACTING THE "SLAVE MENTALITY'
A lesson that Third World countries can learn from the Jamaican experience is that any educational programme-especially when it emanates directly from the political ideology of a government in power-needs to be carefully planned before implementation and integrated meaningfully into the schools' curriculum instead of being 'tacked on' to it at the end. The WEP is part of a curriculum package-the grade 10-11 programme, the motivating force behind which was the ideology of Democratic Socialism which saw the necessity of tightly interweaving national policies for education and work in order that the economic production of the country and its social development could be fully realised [24]. But it is one thing to have a political commitment and quite another to transform that commitment into curriculum reality in the schools. The grade 10-11 programme was altogether hurriedly put together. Self-
instructional modules were developed by lecturers in Teacher Education Colleges and the University of the West Indies, and without trials in pilot schools and systematic evaluation were implemented in all New Secondary schools with the minimum of training on the part of the teachers who were to implement the programme. Plans to remedy weaknesses detected in
these modules have been afoot for at least the past six years, but to date none have
materialised with the result that very negative attitudes towards certain components have developed. Most notably the Life Skills component has suffered from a lack of teachers with the knowledge and skills to teach the subject and from a lack of content relatedness to the life
experience of New Secondary school students. In many schools this component has been
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discontinued and in several others it is dying a slow death, being dubbed 'Dead Skills'. There was no attempt made to articulate the grade 10-11 programme with the rest of the New Secondary School curriculum so as to form a continuing whole from grade 7. Had this been done, the WEP might well have met with greater success. A programme of three weeks' duration at a work station can hardly be taken as a serious attempt to interweave education and work and to combat the negative attitudes towards practical/manual work that prevail in the society. Such attitudes, Manley argues, reflect the misery of the historical experience of the Jamaican people whereby "instead of work being seen as a means by which a man expresses the creativity in himself while he earns his daily bread.., .work is seen as a condition imposed by a master upon a servant as the price of the servant's survival" [32]. Agricultural education and Work Experience Programmes cannot be expected to have any major impact on stigmas against practical/manual work when such programmes are being encouraged in certain types of schools and not others. Admittedly, the plan is that "in future, the Work Experience Programme may be expanded to include the high schools and comprehensive schools" [33], but the programme has now been operative for some seven years and no change is evident in that direction, except on the initiative of one or two individual schools. But even in such instances it is Work Experience in Business Education (or perhaps Technical Education) that is being pioneered-certainly not in Agriculture.
CONCLUSION: THE IMPORTANCE OF PEOPLE IN THE DEVELOPMENT EFFORT
This paper has sought to highlight Agricultural Education and Work Experience Programmes in a Third World country, pinpointing such factors as militate against the achievement of their
desired objectives. Among such factors are problems associated with curriculum organisation at the Secondary level, and the negative attitudes which the society generally has towards a practical curriculum. Inadequate funding largely due to government's aloofness against the background of pressure on schools to become self-reliant, wastage of human resources in relation to programme organisation, and lack of effective communication both within the
school system and between the school and community generally, are also proving to be
constraints on achievement of objectives. The discussion in this paper has lent support to the observation of economists and educators who contend that any proposal for educational reform in Third World countries must begin fundamentally with "radical changes in the existing social and economic system aimed at reducing the relative massive income gaps which exist in these countries, especially those in the modem and those in the traditional sectors of the society" [34]. Before curricular innovations like the Agricultural Education programme and the WEP can have desired effects, Third World countries will not only have to deal constructively with negative attitudes and values in relation to practical and manual labour, but they will also have to find ways of initiating employment-generating strategies so that students who have been prepared for the world of work will be able to enjoy the right to work.
"Development does not start with goods: it starts with people and their education..." [35]. But the people who have the greatest amount of responsibility for translating educational theory and political rhetoric into curriculum reality in the schools are the teachers. And now "more than ever before, those who seek to change schools must change teachers while they are
working in the schools" [36]. This cannot be emphasised too highly especially in a Third World country like Jamaica where the status of the teacher has long been downgraded. The 'profession' has become a dumping ground for many who cannot find anything better to do.
Thus teaching has become a temporary repository for many seeking inroads into the insurance
business or other private sector organisations or for some others who just want 'a little sideline'. But to have their fingers in many pies is a matter of survival for most teachers in Jamaica, whose earnings have been compared to that of the lowest categories of organised
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Agriculture in Schools in a Third World Country 291 manual workers in large private sector establishments. Can we honestly expect to get engineers of human resources development for the price of factory floor sweepers?
The teaching profession needs a complete metamorphosis in order to function meaningfully in any development effort. And it is not just a matter of higher salaries. It is a matter fundamentally of respect for persons: treating teachers as persons. It is a matter of requesting, consulting, asking instead of telling, ordering, treating with contempt.
"Why care for people? Because people are the primary and ultimate source of any wealth whatsoever. If they are left out, if they are pushed around by self-styled experts and highhanded planners, then nothing can ever yield real fruit" [37]. NOTES AND REFERENCES [1] MALASSIS, L. (1976) The Rural World: Education and Development, p. 22 (Croom Helm, London; Unesco Press, Paris). [2] HURST, P. (1981) Aid and educational development: rhetoric and reality, Comparative Education, 17, p. 122. [3] ROGERS, E. M., SHOEMAKER, F.L. (1971) Communication of Innovations: a cross-cultural approach (The Free Press). [4] BACCHUS, M. K. (1974) The primary school curriculum in a colonial society, Journal of Curriculum Studies, 6, p. 27.
[5] BACCHUS, M. K. (1975) Secondary school curriculum and social change in an emergent nation, Journal of Curriculum Studies, Vol. 7, No. 2. [6] BACCHUS, M. K. (1981) Education for development in under-developed countries, Comparative Education, 17, p. 217.
[7] Unicef Regional Primary School Project (1981) Report of Activities and Evaluation (Jamaica), JOYCE JARRETT, School of Education, UWI. [8] BACCHUS (1981) p. 218. [9] The CEE is usually taken by children in primary and preparatory schools at the age of 11 +. The examination determines who will gain entry to the government and government-aided high schools within the public system. [10] The Five Year Education Plan (1978-1983), draft 2, pp. 7-8 (Ministry of Education, Jamaica, 1977). [11] EARLE, J. A. (1977) Jos6 Marti Secondary School: an experiment in the work-study concept, CARSEA, Vol. 2, No. 2.
[12] MILES, M. B. (1964) Innovations in education: some generalizations, in: MILES, M. B. (Ed.) Innovations in
Education (Teachers College, Columbia University). [13] KAY, S. (1975) Curriculum innovations and traditional culture: a case history of Kenya, Comparative Education, Vol. 11, No. 3. [14] EJIOGU, A. M. (1980) When innovations are external to the realities and needs of an organisation: problems of educational innovations in the developing countries, Journal of Curriculum Studies, Vol. 12, No. 2. [15] DUNBAR, A., HUMPHREYS, M., WEBBER, E. & WILLIAMS, L. (1979) Agricultural Education as a Component of the National Agricultural Programme, p. 11 (The Planning and Development Unit, Ministry of Education, Jamaica). [16] See, Minister of Agriculture backs school closure, The Daily Gleaner, Tuesday, January 26th 1982. [17] LOWE, K. & MAHY, Y. (1978) The New Secondary Graduates of 1976 and 1977. Job expectations on leaving school and occupations six months after (Ministry of Education, Jamaica).
[18] MILLER, E. (1976) Education and society in Jamaica, in: FIGUEROA, P. & PERSAUD, G. (Eds) Sociology of
Education: a Caribbean Reader (Oxford University Press). [19] JENNINGS-WRAY, Z. D. (1980) A comparative study of influences and constraints on decision-making in the
primary school curriculum: some implications for the teacher as an agent of change in Third World countries, Journal of Curriculum Studies, Vol. 12, No. 3. [20] The New Secondary student takes the Secondary School Certificate in grade I1--which employers do not value (see [23])--and is more likely to take the Basic Proficiency level of the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC)
while the High School student takes the General Certificate of Education (GCE) or most likely the General
Proficiency level of the CXC. It is the top grades of the latter that are considered comparable to GCE
certification.
[21] This programme is practically and vocationally oriented and geared to equipping students with the knowledge and skills necessary for coping with the realities of everyday living. For example, there is a 'Life Skills' component which seeks to prepare students for the world of living by making sure they have knowledge and experience of, e.g. Child and Health Care, Nutrition, Household budgetting, how to do simple electrical repairs etc., which it is felt students might not have gained from other curriculum areas. The WEP forms the experiential component in preparing the students for the world of work.
[22] TEAPE, V. E. (1980) A study of the work experience programme in Jamaican New Secondary schools: an examination of its usefulness, unpublished BEd study, UWI.
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292
Z.
Jennings-
Wray
[23] MATTIS, D. (1981) The vocational and work experience programmes in two New Secondary schools in Jamaica: an assessment of its contribution to students and their communities, unpublished BEd study, UWI. [24] Cf. Work Experience Handbook: technical and vocational education (Ministry of Education, Jamaica, 1978). [25] Source: The Labour Force 1979 (Department of Statistics, Jamaica, May 1980). [26] MANLEY, M. (1974) The Politics of Change: a Jamaican testament, p. 160 (London, Deutsch). [27] The Jamaica Movement for the Advancement of Literacy Foundation which was established in 1974 to operate a basic adult education programme primarily to eradicate illiteracy by 1978. However, because so many students were still leaving school functionally illiterate the deadline was extended to 1982. [28] THOMPSON, A. R. (1977) How far free? International networks of constraint upon National Education policy in the Third World, Comparative Education, Vol. 13, No. 3. [29] OXTOBY, R. (1977) Vocational education and development planning: emerging issues in the Commonwealth Caribbean, ibid. [30] Source: The Labour Force 1980, p. xiv (Department of Statistics, Jamaica, 1981). [31] MMARI, G. R. V. (1977) Attempts to link school with work: the Tanzanian experience, PROSPECTS, Vol. 7, No. 3.
[32] MANLEY, op. cit., p. 152. [33] Work Experience Handbook, p. 2. [34] BACCHUS (1981) p. 226.
[35] SCHUMACHER, E. F. (1974) Small is Beautiful: a study of economics as if people mattered, p. 140 (London, Abacus). [36] MANN, D. (1976) The politics of training teachers in schools, Teachers College Record, 77, p. 323. [37] SCHUMACHER, op. cit., p. 141.
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