Speed up efforts to employ bursars in primary schools - Speid

Owen Speid, the immediate past president of the Jamaica Teachers' Association (JTA), says efforts to place more bursars in primary schools need speeding up to ease the burden on principals, who have had to assume the responsibilities. 

In his outgoing address to members at the JTA's 56th Annual Conference in Montego Bay, St James, on the weekend, Speid noted that the business of accounts requires the expertise of trained persons.

"Accounting by itself is a full-time job, and it is not fair to leave that on to a principal to do and to carry the other duties of providing instructional leadership for his school," Speid said.

He noted that the onset of COVID-19 has made the need for bursars even more urgent, as principals have more to deal with. 

"Our primary schools at this time are without bursars, and I believe that that is something that should be speeded up in an effort to take some of the workload off the primary school principals."

Speid handed over his responsibilities as president to Jasford Gabriel, the principal of Manchester High School, last week. 

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