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Calls mount for help to reach missing half of Hanover’s students

Published:Thursday | October 22, 2020 | 2:32 PMBryan Miller/Gleaner Writer
Gateway Cooperative Credit Union Marketing Manager Nicole Haughton-Johnson (right) presents Shavoy Hudson (centre) with a gift package containing a tablet and accessories for him to be able to access classes at his school.

Western Bureau:

With roughly half of Hanover’s students unable to access online lessons, calls are mounting for more intervention to prevent pupils at all levels of the education sector from getting left behind.

Teachers, parents, and several community leaders are appealing for changes in the teaching-learning set-up and assistance for the children without devices to access classes or stable Internet connections, especially in remote areas of the western parish.

Nicole Haughton-Johnson, marketing manager of Gateway Co-operative Credit Union (GCCU), has called on businesses to do more to assist the students so they can excel in the new learning environment in the COVID-19 era.

She made the appeal during GCCU’s brief presentation of tablets to 10 students from rural households within Hanover recently, a project executed with the Hanover Social Development Commission.

“Gateway Cooperative Credit Union has always been involved in anything educationally related over the years,” she said.

Addressing the need for better access to devices to join online classes, Johnson called on business leaders to help bridge the gap.

“As a team, everything works better, so we have to put aside our competitive nature,as in banks and credit unions, and come together and see how much we can help,” she appealed.

“The figures are real, and I was surprised when I heard the data in terms of how many students do not have access to any device to access educational facilities,” she stated.

Hopes are high that the Government will help to improve the situation when distribution of tablets to students enrolled under the State’s Programme of Advancement Through Health and Education gets going in the parish.

Apart from a lack of devices, efforts to have students connect remotely to classrooms are bedevilled by Internet connectivity issues.

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