WILLEMSTAD — Minister Omayra Leeflang (Education, PAR) disputes the statement of departing director Sigmund ‘Brother’ Montesant of Fundashon pa Inovashon di Enseñansa na Kòrsou (‘Fide’, institute for education innovation on Curaçao) that the third cycle in the primary education (‘fo’) should have taken place as ‘the international trend for primary education is ten years’.
"A glance at Nationmaster.com shows that the average duration of the primary education is 5.7 years worldwide. The longest lasting educational phase is eight years, while a large number of countries consider seven years", says Leeflang. "Upon a closer consideration of the plans for ten years of primary education, it appears that the purpose of canceling the repeater-issue was, that the designers followed a ‘sameness ideology’ where all pupils would simultaneously start the primary education at the age of four, in order to continue with the secondary education after having received ten years of collective education. However, in order to achieve that final destination simultaneously, the schooling had to be geared to the slowest pupils. That is the basis for the ten-year primary education and not the international trend as the Fide-director states’, the Minister explains.
Examination reports
She recalls that when she became the Minister of Education in 2006, there was no solid ground for the third cycle. There was hardly money to implement the second cycle, and much criticism from the field on the innovations in the primary education. "Also a report from the Antillean Education Inspection, which distinctly indicated that the pupils had encountered a lag after four years of primary education, justified adjustments.
For that purpose, the unfounded third cycle was cancelled as well as the ban on Dutch as teaching language. The Deltaplan states that the teaching language could be Papiamento, Dutch, or English, or a combination of those languages in the primary education. As the School governors and not the politics took that decision, there was no longer a political linguistic conflict within the education.
For that matter, the poignant education results in the reports from the Dutch inspection on schools on the BES-Islands in 2008, confirmed the reasons for adjustments as laid down in the Deltaplan."
She recalls that when she became the Minister of Education in 2006, there was no solid ground for the third cycle. There was hardly money to implement the second cycle, and much criticism from the field on the innovations in the primary education. "Also a report from the Antillean Education Inspection, which distinctly indicated that the pupils had encountered a lag after four years of primary education, justified adjustments.For that purpose, the unfounded third cycle was cancelled as well as the ban on Dutch as teaching language. The Deltaplan states that the teaching language could be Papiamento, Dutch, or English, or a combination of those languages in the primary education. As the School governors and not the politics took that decision, there was no longer a political linguistic conflict within the education.For that matter, the poignant education results in the reports from the Dutch inspection on schools on the BES-Islands in 2008, confirmed the reasons for adjustments as laid down in the Deltaplan."
‘Peace and clarity’
Setting the primary education term at eight years, (where only pupils requiring more time could remain in the primary education for another two years at the most), the clustering of pre-school kindergarten and elementary school, the subjecting to tests, the re-implementation of report marks, and the subjecting to national diagnostic tests in group 7, are all matters, which were decided upon ‘after thorough discussions with teachers, school governors, parents and policy makers in order to standardize the primary education’.
Currently, the ideal of a minimal professional qualification for all youngsters is pursued through the extended compulsory education at various levels up to the eighteenth year.
According to Leeflang, the legal formalization of the adjustments in the primary education by the Deltaplan has provided for ‘peace and clarity’ within the education and an end has come to the endless innovations and the constant changing education innovation policy, which began in 1998.
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