No dunce allowed

Students who show up at Jonathan Grant High School tomorrow carrying backpacks with the word ‘Dunce’ printed on them will be barred from classes, a defiant Principal Dr O’Neil Ankle has warned.

“If a child shows up with it on Monday, he will have to get another bag. He is not coming into the school with that bag,” the principal of the Spanish Town, St Catherine-based school declared during a Sunday Gleaner interview on Friday.

“I will not allow it and I know I’m going to get strap for it, but I don’t care,” he declared, disclosing that the prohibition has already been communicated to students and parents.

With the new academic year set to fully start tomorrow, other public schools canvassed by The Sunday Gleaner said they will also be taking a tough stance on the Dunce-branded book bags; however, not to the extent of barring students from entering the compound.

The Jamaica Association of Principals of Secondary Schools (JAPSS) disclosed on Friday that there was no consensus among its membership for the treatment of the controversial backpacks that have enjoyed strong sales amid wide public backlash.

The word ‘Dunce’ has been a hot topic since breakout dancehall artiste Valiant released his smash hit song Dunce Cheque late last year. Critics say the song, with the lyrics “back a di class me n’ave no subject”, sends a negative message to the country’s younger population, especially at a time when a high percentage of students are falling behind academically.

A representative for Valiant’s management team declined to comment for this story.

But despite the backlash, one local company and streetside vendors have seen a financial windfall from the sale of Dunce-branded backpacks that retail for $11,500 and $20,000, according to checks by this newspaper last week.

The company’s website said the bags, with a price tag of US$74, are sold out.

‘You are created for excellence’

The Jonathan Grant High School principal was blunt and unapologetic in his stance, pointing out that the school’s motto is ‘Strive for Excellence’ and its affirmation for the student population is ‘I am Created for Excellence’. The parent affirmation is ‘My Child is Created for Excellence’.

The justification for the school’s tough position is obvious, the headmaster stated.

“Why is it that I am going to say to my students every morning when I meet with them that ‘you are created for excellence’, and then you are going to be trumping a word that everybody in Jamaica knows means somebody who is worthless and has no goals?” Ankle questioned.

“Dunce? And you must be walking around with that label on your back? No!”

The Fayval Williams-led education ministry did not respond to questions submitted by The Sunday Gleaner about whether the ban breached any government policy, directive or guidelines.

Dr Maureen Dwyer, acting permanent secretary in the ministry, said she wanted to discuss the issue with Williams before responding to the questions.

“Minister has not commented. I await her directive,” she said on Friday.

There was no response up to late yesterday.

However, Ankle said he “doubts” that the ministry has a policy that addresses the issue.

“This is a policy that I have taken as an institution,” he told The Sunday Gleaner.

At the start of the new school year, the education ministry said it circulated a draft of its ‘Student Dress & Grooming Policy For Public Educational Institutions’. According to the ministry, the aim is to develop a policy for educational institutions that will balance students’ rights while complying with school rules.

A conversation for parents

Principal of Central High School, Stellavit Ingram, said he has also taken a strong position on his students donning the Dunce backpacks; however, they will not be barred from classes.

He told The Sunday Gleaner that a warning was sent to students and parents before the start of the new academic year last Monday that “we won’t entertain the fully dunce”.

No student at the Clarendon-based school showed up with any of the controversial backpacks last week, he disclosed.

“We will not be sending any student back home. That’s a conversation for us and a parent who gives a child a bag that says ‘Dunce’,” Ingram noted.

Haile Selassie High School, located in St Andrew, will also take a similar approach when students return to classes this week, according to Principal Lorenzo Ellis.

Ellis, a veteran educator, is “disturbed” by the phenomenon, but said the school will first issue a warning to parents and students while seeking to educate them about “promoting positives rather than negatives”.

“I am not going to start off by saying no entry. That would be the last thing to do. And even if I’m going to do that, it will be after negotiation with the parents,” Ellis told The Sunday Gleaner.

‘Ridiculous and disturbing’

Amid support from some stakeholder groups for the ban imposed at Jonathan Grant High, human rights lobby Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ) has slammed the move as “ridiculous and disturbing”.

JFJ Executive Director Mickel Jackson argued, too, that the ban raises issues regarding the students’ constitutional rights to freedom of expression and their right to proper education.

“How can a branded bag with a word – no matter what one’s subjective view of that bag and the word printed on it may be – warrant a child being turned away from school?” she questioned.

The Jonathan Grant High School principal expected the pushback.

“Persons are going to say ‘what about free speech?’ But there should be free speech with responsibility. So are they saying that a child can just walk into school with anything written on their bag that is derogatory and we must accept it because of free speech?”Ankle asked.

JAPSS President Linvern Wright also sounded a word of caution for the human rights advocates.

“In any institution or organisation, your rights are constrained by your responsibility to ensure that the values and goals of that institution are things that you are upholding,” Wright reasoned.

Schools can do what they must to maintain order

Attorney-at-law John Clarke believes administrators at Jonathan Grant High will be on safe grounds if the imposition of the ban conforms to the rule-making mechanism established by the school’s board of management.

To bolster his view, Clarke pointed to a ruling by Jamaica’s Full Court that schools can “essentially do what they must to maintain order”.

The 2020 ruling by a three-member panel of High Court judges marked the end of a lawsuit filed by the parents of a five-year-old girl who was denied entry to Kensington Primary School in Portmore, St Catherine, because of her dreadlocked hairstyle.

The family had claimed, among other things, that the actions of the school amounted to a breach of their child’s constitutional right to freedom of expression.

“So, in other words, the schools can do what they must and the principals can do what they must to maintain what they view as good order, but one hopes that it will be done in a manner that is consistent with their own rules,” Clarke reasoned.

“I doubt that many of the school rules would be wide enough to say if you come to school with a bag that says ‘Dunce’ then the principal can turn you back. So in those circumstances, one would hope that the actions they are taking are governed and managed by rules.”

‘Children are impressionable’

Stewart Jacobs, president of the National Parent-Teacher Association of Jamaica, said a majority of its members would like to see the ban replicated across all schools in Jamaica.

According to Jacobs, the leadership of the association has received calls from parents concerned that Dunce-branded bags could negatively impact their children.

“Children are impressionable and what they don’t want is for their child to come home thinking it’s okay to have that bag,” Jacobs shared with The Sunday Gleaner.

“So they are asking us to try and minimise, as best, the number of schools that allow students to attend school wearing the bags. I am asking that no school in Jamaica allow one child through the gate with a bag like that.”

livern.barrett@gleanerjm.com