Parents in most schools organize themselves in Parent Teacher’s Associations/Foundations. Parents’ Associations or Parents’ Committees as stipulated under of the Law on FBE .
Parents are the voice of the children in their schools. Meetings have been organized and conducted by DEI, coordinated by Ms. Rijkaard, coordinator for Parental Involvement FBE/PSVE, to get all Parents Associations organized in an umbrella Parents Association. This association will be an official entity recognized by the Government of St. Maarten and will function on behalf of parents of all school- going children on St. Maarten .
After several meetings, discussions and workshops , a group of dedicated , hardworking parents volunteered their time and drafted a constitution for the umbrella organization, the National Parents Platform ( NPP) . They will be charged with issues such as: Advising the Minister on matters regarding establishing or changing the complaint procedures, establishing or changing school regulations just, to name a few examples; promoting and supporting parental involvement in general, and more specifically in the education of their children; providing training to Parent Committees; and connecting parents, guardians and families with the resources and support necessary to effectively advocate the educational rights of children.
In order to start the process of getting the Platform in place a total of 11 parents committed themselves to form the Steering Committee. This Steering Committee met on Wednesday October 26th with the coordinator for DEI and agreed to put an action plan in place for starting the process of formulating and legalize the National Parents’ Platform. Through financing by USONA, DEI ensures that this will take place no later than April 2014. In the meantime there will be a series of awareness campaigns to sensitize parents and the community at large to their parental role.
We congratulate the initiative and the commitment of these dedicated and involved parents . We also congratulate the Rotary Club in collaboration with the Sundial school who took the initiative to host a special session for fathers this coming week. Parenting is every-one’s business indeed!