'Big yard tracing' by JTA bigwigs

THE EDITOR, Sir:

Just when I thought that the impasse between the teachers and the education minister had sunk to an all-time low with the analogy drawn by former president of the Jamaica Teachers' Association (JTA), Dorian Dixon, here comes immediate past president Paul Adams to sink the discourse to what I deem 'standpipe tracing'. The only thing missing was a bath pan filled with clothes.

At one with the islandwide consultation, Mr Adams made some excellent points on behalf of the teachers when he spoke to issues such as teacher-student ratio and drawing the parallel with our Caribbean counterparts. He also spoke to the politics involved in teacher transfers, etc.

Mr Adams had me on his side until he resorted to the tenement yard behaviour, because for him to have said the minister must have been "temporarily injected with cocaine" is tantamount to saying that the minister of education, his superior, is a coke head.

bad example

How could Mr Adams have taken the discourse to this level? What kind of an example is he setting for those teachers who sat in that meeting and indeed cheered him? Does Mr Adams expect teachers and students to exhibit any respect when he himself could not restrain from spewing such venom at the minister?

Let us recall that just a day before, the former president of the JTA, Dorian Dixon, used the analogy of a mongrel dog to characterise the minister.

Messrs Adams and Dixon need to publicly apologise to the minister and to the nation. Such expressions are tasteless, classless and vulgar.

How do they expect our children looking on to behave? If this kind of utterance can come from them towards the minister, I would shudder at the thought of how they would address a student if there was disagreement.

RALSTON CHAMBERLAIN

ralston.chamberlain@mail.utoronto.ca

Toronto, Ontario