Civil Servants to Be Given One Day Per Month to be Involved In Activities at their Children’s Schools
The Prime Minister of St. Maarten the Honorable Sarah Wescot-Williams on Thursday launched the Parent Power Involvement Program which is geared towards allowing parents to spend one day a month in the schools of their children actively involved in their educational activities.
Some months ago the Prime Minister announced the she was actively perusing the initiating of a program where Civil Servants would be given the opportunity to spend one day a month engaging their children and their children’s classmates in activities at the school, allowing greater involvement in the education of their children.
Caption: Prime Minister Wescot-Williams Explaining Program to Pilot Project Participants/ Prime Minister Wescot-Williams with the initial participants of the Parent Power Involvement Program
"A project that I announced some time ago which is the parents participation program I am very happy to announced has been launched with a Pilot Group. Some months ago I announced that what I really wanted to do is to have Government lead by example in allowing our employees to take part in our children’s education. For this pilot project I have selected fifteen participants and together with their respective Department Heads and the schools of their children these persons will have one day in the month to spend in their child’s education, either at the school with their child or engaged in the activities of the children in the schools such as field trips and I hope this will lead to our schools being more visited by parents. One of the complaints across the board from teachers is the lack of parental involvement in the education of their children. As the children grow older you see the involvement grow less and less and as an employer we want to give a day to registered Civil Servants to spend a day on their children’s education. It is not as if they will stay at home their child or children but they will actively engage with their child’s education in school," commented the Prime Minister.
During the kick-off event the Prime Minister also stressed to the participants that it was her wish to see government take the lead in the project and to see the private sector follow suit. "I need you to work with me in order to make this happen", the PM commented, "your supervisors will be informed of what will be occurring and eventually I would like to see what the predominant activities you have been involved in with your child during the one activity per month. Hopefully this will catch on in the private sector which I also very much look forward to," commented the Prime Minister.