Losing the school transfer lottery
Rural children forced to suffer long, pricey commutes
Published:Monday | August 22, 2022 | 12:10 AMCecelia Campbell-Livingston/Gleaner Writer
Nickeisha Singh Smith, 32, is one frustrated and worried mother.
She is pondering the future of her 12-year-old son, who was placed at Foga Road High School 17 kilometres (around 10.5 miles) away from her home in Hayes, Clarendon.
With the deck already stacked against her as she cares for her bedridden husband, who suffered three strokes and is unable to help himself, she has to give him round-the-clock care, marginalising her chances of landing a steady job.
A pleading Singh Smith has visited Vere Technical High, which is just a few yards from where she lives, seeking a spot at the school.
But the school has no more available slots.
It is a concern that haunts hundreds of parents islandwide when the dust settles from the Primary Exit Profile – the transitional examination that places primary- and prep-school children into high schools.
High transport fares
And despite the Ministry of Education, across various political administrations, committing to assign students close to home, Jamaica’s system of placement sometimes gets it wrong – or finds it difficult to accommodate children on a needs basis.
It is a jeopardy from which many children in Kingston and St Andrew are insulated. They are beneficiaries of superdiscounted transport fares on Jamaica Urban Transit Company buses – funded partly by rural taxpayers miles away who are alien to those relative economic comforts.
Singh Smith’s dilemma may seem surmountable, but for poor, rural families on shoestring budgets, missing out on a place in a nearby school could be the difference between life and debt.
“It is closer. If he is to go to Foga, I will have to have at least $1,500 per day for taxi fare and lunch for him to go to school, and that is really hard to find at this moment,” she said in a Gleaner interview.
Singh Smith earns income of $20,000 from the bar her husband owns and she rents. However, monthly expenses more than double that intake, leaving her struggling to make ends meet.
Her husband is diabetic, hypertensive, and wears adult diapers. Even with a National Health Fund card, the monthly cost of his diabetes medication, which is not covered, is $14,000.
As the weeks rolled by, Smith shied away from registering her son at Foga Road, clinging desperately to the fading hope that somehow, some way, he would be placed close to home.
Barrington Richardson, regional director of the Ministry of Education’s Region Seven, is urging parents in crisis cases to reach out to government offices.
“Where there is a distance challenge that would allow the child not to attend school consistently, they visit their regional office of the ministry within that particular region and have the matter discussed, and the officers will provide support in having the child placed in the best interest,” Richardson told The Gleaner.
But that is little comfort for many families who know of the competitive race for reserved spots at high schools.
Singh Smith is not alone in her struggle.
Brena Jackson, who lives in Simon, Rock River, said that it costs her granddaughter approximately $1,500 a day to attend Edwin Allen High in Frankfield.
Pointing out that she has unsuccessfully sought a transfer for the past two years, her granddaughter has to take three taxis to school each day – from Simon to Rock River, then another to Chapelton, and the final leg to Frankfield.
“She don’t know her father, and her mother have more children, and she not working either. Nutten nuh wrong wid di school, but a di expenses. Sometimes she reach home in the nights because of vehicle problem,” Jackson said.
Enrolment falling
Texal Christie, principal of Kellits High School in northern Clarendon, said while his school can accommodate transfers, it has been receiving many requests.
“The problem for us is not space. It is in regards to the other schools. They call me and tell me that they’re not gonna release any more students because their enrolment is falling,” Christie told The Gleaner, explaining that there is a lower birth rate in that area.
Principal of Clarendon College, David Wilson, said the school has received more than 50 requests – particularly for grade seven.
With 300 students being placed in the PEP cohort, Clarendon College gave the green light to 10 outbound students and accepted 25.
“Whereas some schools charge a fee for application and a placement test, we only ask for the PEP results and make a placement based on need and/or association with the school,” Wilson said.
“Of note, too, is whereas some parents send their children to Frankfield Primary for five or six years from Chapelton area, they now claim that Edwin Allen is too far for the children to travel.”