Education: Challenges and Opportunities

Now that the latest results of this year’s CAPE and CSEC examinations have been published and distributed, a new phase of life for the hundreds who sat the examination confronts them, a phase which has direct bearing on their future. It presents them with new opportunities, but in turn, new challenges confront them.

In the past, success at these levels or their equivalent virtually guaranteed secure employment either in the public service or teaching professions, such was our limited horizons.

Fortunately, those days are way behind us for we are in the 21st century with all that this entails. What was once considered a lifetime secure job is no longer the zenith of our ambitions, nor does our shoreline confine our young people.

The world, despite the narrowness of many of its political leaders, is an interactive one and one’s place of birth is no longer a limitation. What matters now is how we manage to access and handle the opportunities presented.

We have come a long way but there is much further to go.

Gone are the days when becoming a lawyer or a doctor was the apex of our journey. There is a wide-open field and today’s successes at the regional examinations may well be aiming at becoming a nuclear physicist or a brainchild in the world of space exploration. Such are the possibilities before us.

Unfortunately, there are still too many among us, often in the wrong places, who are still stuck in the past. So, we hear arguments about why we are educating so many young people and our job market cannot absorb them all. It is a non-progressive and narrow viewpoint which fails to appreciate the dynamism of the modern world. People no longer pursue their education just to be employed in their own environment. In fact, in every society there are areas of employment in which non-residents must be imported. The famed Silicon Valley in the USA depends heavily on so-called foreigners, while myopic politicians fool people about foreigners crossing their borders and taking away jobs. The world is inter-dependent and in fact exposure of our qualified personnel to job experiences in more developed economies may well redound to our collective benefit.

Additionally, who would have thought 25 years ago that little S Vincent and the Grenadines would have cadres of educated persons who, besides their field of training, are versed in languages such as Mandarin and Spanish, which vastly enhances their flexibility in the modern world? Education is an investment for life, not just academically, but increasingly in all fields. Admittedly, we need to iron out the kinks in our educational armour and to build into our process wider and vital skills in understanding people and society and developing the concepts of human solidarity and collective effort.

Nevertheless, with all our limitations, and the need for better deployment of our skills, we have a platform on which we can build. Let us make use of it and the opportunities before us.