Martinique’s Eric Ildefonse headed a music workshop at the St Lucia School of Music.

At the invitation of Alliance Française to perform at the Jazz and Arts Festival of Saint Lucia, jazz pianist and composer Eric Ildefonse entertained at events including Jazz in the South and Jazz on the Square. In addition to his performances on May 5 at Balenbouche and on May 9 in Castries, Eric Ildefonse headed a music workshop at the St Lucia School of Music.

Speaking very little English in our interview,  Eric lamented that there is not enough Jazz in the new concept. “I felt the great atmosphere and the warmth of the people,” he said, “but I would’ve loved to hear more jazz.” He was however pleased that at Jazz in the South and Jazz on the Square “there were some amazing jazzy performances.”

According to Idlefonse, the patrons were “really welcoming.” St Lucians are “musically curious.” Although his music is from a neighboring island “the people here are also Creoles, so we managed to understand each other. I find it fantastic.”

On the other hand, he said, there was certain “Africanness” missing in the Jazz he heard. As an African descendant, he wanted to work on drum rhythms which, he says, has been forgotten. He acknowledges the African in himself and hopes to deepen his knowledge of all things African.

His album “Reconnaissance” is, according to the artist, very close to Saint Lucian music. In fact, it contains calypso, ska, chachacha, samba . . .  The album focuses on Caribbean music, with contributions by Saint Lucian saxophonist Luther Francois.  “It offers the opportunity for Saint Lucians to discover Luther playing a different type of music,” Idlefonse smiled, “a great reason to buy the album.”

He expressed his gratitude to Alliance Française for affording him the opportunity to achieve his dream of sharing his personal evolution with students at the Castries School of Music.

He said he learned a lot from the young people who returned him to his “inner child” so as to better communicate with them. His exchanges with them were “wonderful” and his audience “very receptive.”

He added: “They were highly receptive, they participated, they got involved and wanted more. I found this extraordinary. The future lies there, very young, very innocent. I am glad that I was able to plant a little seed in their curiosity and make them want to focus on several instruments, and also to focus on their own Africanness.”

Richard Payne, the executive director of the School of Music, was also happy with the workshop. He said the partnership started two years ago with Alliance Française and over time has strengthened.

“There are many other exciting projects we are hoping to work on,” he said.

Payne would like his young students to have the opportunity to travel to the Francophone territories like Martinique and Guadeloupe, to share and exchange ideas.

“Like I always say,” he added, “we share the same Creole language and culture. I think that it’s just a matter of discovering that truth. It’s there in our DNA.”

Eric Ildefonse

The scene? One of the more remarkable conventions of the St Lucia Labour Party, held in Laborie. It was on this occasion that Peter Josie and Lawson Calderon had dared to challenge the SLP leadership, then represented by the singular Julian R. Hunte.

Yes, the guy with the fried-chicken platter is the irrepressible Juk Bois. The gentleman fingering him is none other than Philip J. Pierre, whose interaction with the local radio legend brought a smile to the face of Hilary Modeste, identified by some readers as Lawson Calderon (now also deceased). As for the gentleman in the striped shirt and (St Clair Daniel sideburns), his name is Severalus Jeffrey, one-time SLP secretary.

No need to say what Pierre and Sam Flood are doing today; let’s just say, same as usual, although from somewhat different perches. Modeste, once an SLTB hotshot, has been doing wondrous things in London, steering tourists toward Antigua & Barbuda. Jeffrey now makes his home in New York.

And now for next week’s mind jogger. This time we want to know what you
know about the book pictured and about its author.   

Ryan Mack, President of Optimum Capital Management: What crimes did local financial institutions commit to deserve his special attention?

Ryan Mack is an African-American and president of Optimum Capital Management. By his own account, he is also a “financial advisor working with many prominent clients across the U.S. and charitably lends his support to the inner-city communities by coordinating workshops and creating economic empowerment initiatives that teach the principles of understanding the power of financial literacy.”

Moreover: “Unions, churches, government-subsidized housing communities and especially colleges have benefitted from the financial workshops/programs that he has development and instructed through Optimum Capital Management.”

Mack is also a blogger for the Business section of Huffington Post, wherein recently he revealed he had spoken frequently against financial predators and their prominent friends, among them Russell Simmons, BET, Magic Johnson, the Kardashians and Suze Orman.

For the benefit of recent arrivals from Mars (although it is quite possible aliens know more about us than we care to know of ourselves!): Simmons is a business magnate who pioneered the famous hip-hop label Def Jam, the clothing fashion lines Phat Farm, Argyleculture, and American Classics. No need to introduce BET, Magic Johnson or the Kardashians—all legendary household names even where no houses exist. As for Suze Orman, she is a New York Times best-selling author, financial advisor, motivational speaker and host of the Emmy Award-winning Suze Orman Show. Her self-declared raison d’être: “Helping people make the connection between self-worth and net worth.”

So what crimes had the above-mentioned committed to deserve Ryan Mack’s special attention?

“All of these products [they endorse] are legally sound but lack any sense of moral responsibility to actually help those they pretend to be serving. All involved in these despicable practices have chosen to select profit over principal [sic] and for this I will continue to speak out. I will speak out to expose their wrongful practices as well as educate the community about the best alternatives found mostly within the principles of fiscal responsibility.” So stated the blogger himself in the Business section of the May 8 issue of the Huffington Post.

From all I’ve gathered, Mack was last month the special guest of Dr Stephen King’s RISE group. His mission: “To advise young Saint Lucians with neither means nor knowledge how to make sound business and financial decisions.”

The same good people who had earlier suggested the RISE chief executive bring to Saint Lucia the charismatic Carl Marx had also hooked King up with Mack, the predator hunter. Unforgettably, Dr Marx’s highly controversial appeals on behalf of local youth had resulted in the Stephenson King government reluctantly agreeing to foot tuition fees and other expenses for several young Saint Lucians now studying in the United States. As I recall, before the dust settled there had been need of convenient explanations and apologies!

While in Saint Lucia last month Ryan Mack had lectured such groups as the NSDC, CARE and the Upton Gardens Girls. He had also addressed Bordelais inmates. But busy as conceivably was his schedule, Mack had nevertheless found time to hunt down his favorite prey. At any rate, so he revealed in his earlier cited blog in the widely read Huffington Post.

To quote Mack directly: “Imagine my surprise while on a mission trip to educate the community in St Lucia when I found similar practices. [“similar,” as in the activities of the aforementioned ‘financial predators’ Simmons, BET etc.] In my discussions with the community I ran across the firm FastCash, which provides short-term loans with interest rates as high as the Pay Day Loan industry in the States. When you include the fees, you could be paying fees as high as 200 percent interest to pay back those loans, according to local sources. This predator decided this important information was not important enough to display on their website.”

But nothing he had ever confronted in the financial wild west was quite as bad as a particular species he encountered in backwater Saint Lucia: “Of all the financial predators I have seen, whether in the U.S. or elsewhere, none was worse in terms of foolishness, irresponsibility and turpitude.”

His bad, bad, bad Leroy Brown turned out to be Axcel Finance, by Mack’s measure “a micro-finance institution that just started operations in St Lucia a little over a year ago.”

Additionally: “Axcel specializes in short-term loans—code for high-interest loans— mainly for healthcare, education and home furnishings. So if you get sick unexpectedly, need money for school or want to purchase furniture for your home, they aspire to be the provider of services to you. Axcel Finance claims to have a new idea for community empowerment, an idea that was inspired and endorsed by a carnival band named Toxik Nation. I could not think of a more toxic product for the people of St Lucia.”

Additionally: “I have been in St Lucia over a week doing multiple workshops for various groups of people, most of them disadvantaged, and have yet to find anyone who agrees with the program.

“Axcel has decided to unveil a new loan product offering to help people who cannot afford to jump in carnival . . . Why would Axcel do this? The answer is simple: so you can party. Clearly, if you are currently in debt and cannot afford a costume, wear a wristband signifying you are a member of a winning band, follow that band during the parade and go to multiple parties by that band, it makes no sense to go deeper into debt just to party.

Directly addressing Axcel, Mack asks: “Are you so hungry to make money that you will prey upon people who are so down on their luck and are desperately in need of an escape from their impoverished state? Shame on you for bringing this idea to market. Shame on you for partnering with Toxic Nation that obviously has a vested interest in this deal because they will be on the receiving end of the monies. And shame on you for helping create a more permanent underclass of society by keeping poor people under the unnecessary pressure of unnecessary debt.”

Finally Ryan Mack addresses the whole country: “I understand the historical significance of carnival. I understand what it means to the people to be part of this long-standing tradition. I am not asking you to give up participating in this event. I am asking you to be responsible in how you participate in carnival. Educate yourselves of the best way to have fun but not at the risk of your own and your family’s financial security. Instead of a $1200 loan for VIP access for carnival, can you save $100 per month and put it toward an investment of long-term value, like land, education, savings, stocks, or a new business? It is not enough to be angry only at Axcel. We must also be angry with ourselves for allowing our actions to open the door for these predators to exist in our communities in the first place.”

Does predator hunter Ryan Mack know all he should know about this particular jungle? Does he know Dr King is also an influential member of the Saint Lucia Senate whose voice carries weight—as Carl Marx and Stephenson King can attest?  How did our ubiquitous slot machines and other inducements to gamble all over the country, regardless of the player’s age, escape Mack’s knife? Or is Dr King planning to RISE up on that little matter during his coming Budget address?

I gather the Speaker of the House is embroiled in a court matter involving the gaming that from all I can gather sustains at least one government project here.

Surprisingly, FastCash and Axcel Finance representatives saw no urgent need to comment publicly on Mack’s blog. Even more surprising is that the blogger had written not a word about the fact that at least one of the alleged financial predators is owned by an American company that benefits from all the evil underscored by Mack. So now, shame on who?

The island’s homicide rate stands at 10 thus far for 2013.

Add two more names to the growing list of murders in St Lucia this year. This weekend was supposed to be the crowning jewel of the St Lucia Jazz and Arts Festival, which had already been applauded for it’s high profile fashion extravaganza and quality performances over the course of the two week spectacle. Instead the festivities were bookended by reports of crime.

On Friday, 27-year-old Precious Ambrose of Patience, Mon Repos died from a neck injury, sustained during a disagreement with another individual, who has since been taken into custody. The expected Jazz debriefing became a post mortem of another kind on Monday when news broke that 32-year-old Sheldon Alvin Lewis was found stabbed to death at his residence in Leslie Land, Castries. There have been no arrests made.

These two incidents are just the latest in a series of murders on the island in 2013. In mid-January Danley Leon, a 25-year-old Corinth resident, died from stab wounds incurred after engaging in an altercation. In February, police were met with a gruesome scene when they discovered the body of 47-year-old Simone Leandra Garnier near her home in Bisee. Garnier’s throat had been slashed and her legs bound together. Later that month, Dennery resident Nathan Uria Stanisclas succumbed to his injuries after being stabbed during an argument. March brought yet another stabbing, when 49-year-old Annie Fortune of Conway, Castries was attacked by another female.

April ushered in the high-profile murder of Reduit native Krystal Felix, a popular fixture on the St Lucian scene. The 22-year-old was gunned down at the Auberge Seraphine parking lot after returning from a boat ride on Easter Monday. Nathan Duncan of Grass Street is currently being held in connection with Felix’s death. Later that month, the lifeless body of 61-year-old Tita Wilfred was recovered from an abandoned building in the Vieux-Fort area. Her head appeared to have been smashed. And in a case almost too gory to believe, the partially decomposing body of 41-year-old Winston Brown of Rodney Bay was found stuffed in a refrigerator with several wounds to the hands and head.

Earlier this year, the Royal St Lucia Police Force held a press conference to report that detection of crime was on the rise and the murder rate had been steadily declining since 2010. Last year 37 murders were reported, a drop from the 39 and 44 cases in 2011 and 2010 respectively.

Acting Sergeant of Police in the Central Intelligence Unit Kimroy Renee touched on a disturbing trend that has become an undeniable cause of concern for the department— increased incidences of sharp objects being used as the weapon of choice among criminals.

“We’re still recording high numbers of incidents where sharp knives, sharp objects, cutlasses are used in committing crimes like murders and this is one of the approaches that the police force wants to take, a zero tolerance approach, to persons being in possession of such weapons and not being able to justify why they carry such weapons,” he said.

When contacted for a tally of the numbers to date this year, officers were cagey and expressed that they were not at liberty to disclose such information. As we went to press, the police press relations department provided confirmation that the island’s homicide rate stands at 10 so far for 2013.

This week Minister for the Public Service James Fletcher convened a press conference centered on the conclusion of negotiations with the CSA.

Just when the Saint Lucia Civil Service Association imagined it had outwitted the government, more proof that things are not always as they appear.

Last month the CSA ended negotiations with its refusal of a proffered four percent wage increase, following months of wrangling with the Government. In the best interests of the country, the CSA announced, it had opted to accept the government’s initial offer of zero increase.

On Monday this week the Minister for the Public Service James Fletcher convened a press conference centered on the conclusion of negotiations with the CSA. Before delivering the news that the government was about to hand the union exactly what they had refused, Dr Fletcher presented attending reporters with a rear-view-mirror perspective of the situation.

He first listed the nine public sector unions and staff associations that had sat down with the Government Negotiating Team. Fletcher said the negotiations for the period April 1, 2010 to 31 March 2013 were in three cycles.

“The first cycle deals with non- financial terms and conditions of employment. The second cycle addresses allowances while the third focuses on wages and salaries,” Fletcher explained.

He then outlined the various scenarios that had transpired during the negotiations on wages and salaries, with the public sector unions represented by the umbrella body of the TUF. These included the government’s first offer of zero with a lump sum bonus of EC$1000. “The GNT subsequently put three new proposals on the table: zero, zero with a $750 lump sum payment; zero, zero, with a $500 lump sum, and zero, zero, three.”

Said Fletcher: “The GNT, in an attempt to bring the negotiations to an amicable conclusion, made a final offer of four percent to the TUF. This salary and wage settlement was accepted by all members of the TUF, with the exception of the CSA.

He pointed out that the CSA was demanding 9.5 percent plus a series of conditions. The GNT subsequently wrote to the union outlining the final offer of four percent, plus seven conditions.

“However the CSA responded to this letter by informing the government that at a meeting of its members 228 public officers voted to accept a zero settlement for the 2010 to 2013 triennium,” said Fletcher.

He said the Cabinet of ministers had “deliberated on this matter” and was guided by a number of factors including the scenario where officers represented by one union could be paid less than officers represented by other unions who are in the same pay grade if the CSA position was accepted. This, he said would create serious anomalies.

“Secondly there are currently over 2,500 civil servants. Only 228 voted for a zero wage settlement. Additionally, there are several petitions from several government agencies requesting payment of the same settlement agreed to with other members of the TUF. The number of names on those petitions already dwarfs the number of people who voted for the zero wage settlement,” the minister said.

“Cabinet has since agreed to pay all civil servants a four percent increase to correct the anomalies created by the decision of the CSA,” Fletcher told the media Monday. “As a result of the correction of these anomalies, the civil servants will also receive the differences in salaries that would have accrued as a result of the salary increases that will now be applied for the respective years.”

Dr. Fletcher went on to say that the Cabinet still recognized the 228 who had voted not to accept a salary increase and has agreed that any civil servant not wishing to have the four percent salary increase should put it in writing.

“These public servants are asked to write to their respective Permanent Secretaries who is the accounting officer for the agency, copied to the accountant general, indicating that they do not wish to accept the salary increase. This letter or memo should be sent to the Permanent Secretary before May 31, to allow for the necessary changes to be made by the Treasury Department.”

Asked to explain the caveat, Fletcher reiterated that government was aware of several petitions from CSA members requesting the four percent. “But that is not what is guiding us. What is guiding us is the fact that we believe there will be anomalies created in the accounting system. But those anomalies will not only affect things right now, but we believe that since we have already started negotiations for the next triennium 2013-2016 it means now that civil servants themselves will be starting at a disadvantage because not everybody is starting at the same point.”

The Minister added that the GNT will also be going through its own post-mortem and recommended a fresh pair of eyes and ears for the process.

As has become the norm, Jazz was every bit a family oriented affair in 2013.

I’m still mulling over whether this year’s Saint Lucia Jazz & Arts Festival was indeed “the best yet” as some have proclaimed. I will not hesitate to say the event was very good, filled with more than a few highs and only here and there a low.

Then again, after covering the festival for all of its 22 years maybe I am a little bit jaded. And while some of my past critiques may have marked me a trouble-maker by some friends at the Saint Lucia Tourist Board, others have seen the wisdom in what I wrote, though they won’t admit it.

Still, I have always supported, even when others have not, the continuation of the festival. The main complaint for some observers of the event has been that staging it costs too much money for the festival to be profitable. In any case, that profit argument was washed away this week by the undeniable financial benefits accrued by vendors, service providers, restaurants, guest houses and small hotels, beverage companies, boutiques, taxi drivers, Saint Lucian performers and so on.

On the last day of the festival, which drew more than five thousand paying patrons at EC$200 a pop, the fact that Heineken and other beverages ran out quickly was indeed a sign of the amount spent this year by patrons. I am sure those with more financial acumen than I can arrive at a figure far exceeding the EC$8 million that the SLTB spent on the festival.

The feel-good factor of this year’s festival could have easily been attributed to the number of Saint Lucian singers, musicians, dancers, poets, sculptors, painters and stage hands who were now involved through the arts component of the event. Add to that the hundreds of volunteers now all serving as ambassadors to the event and the picture gets clearer. The line-up of the festival this year (which I believe was very good but not great) only tells half the story. Indeed, it cannot on its own set the stage for a festival without great venues and the buy-in from your local populace.

The festival for me has always meant more than standing in the media pit all day analyzing each and every performance. It has been and continues to be about engaging patrons, visitors and some of the performers, the ambience. This year’s atmosphere throughout the festival was astounding.

So with all of this said, let me now point out a few lows of mine at this year’s festival:

• First; the performances by Ginuwine and Akon. Both wore white, which goes to show it does not always indicate purity. Ginuwine’s performance was lackluster and devoid of any strong connection with his audience. But then what do you expect when you pay a man who has had four major hits twenty thousand dollars. As for Akon, he entertained the crowd with some of his monster hits and while many enjoyed his ride through the crowd, his flawless lip- synching just would not cut it. Come on, Akon, you came here with a more than 20-strong entourage just so people might read your lips?  Maybe lawyer and SLTB deputy chairman Thaddeus Antoine can slip in a clause into next year’s contracts that demands all performers actually sing live.

Ginuwine failed to make a connection with the audience.

•     My final low, and this one is not on the SLTB, was the lack of initiative taken to offer patrons and visitors “Saint Lucia Jazz & Arts Festival” branded souvenirs: caps, bandanas, tee-shirts and the like.

The highs of 2013:

•    The return of Jazz on the square of course which created a buzz in the city around the festival.

*The long list of Saint Lucian performers involved both on main-stage and fringe activities. Emrand Henry, Barbara Cadet, Luther Francois, Ronald “Boo” Hinkson, Rob Zi, Ricky T, Ace, Superman HD, Mervin Wilkinson, Mongstar, 4th World Band, Emerson Nurse, TJ, Stacey and many others. Both “Boo” and Luther went the extra mile to showcase more local talent during their main-stage gigs, Luther with a calypso collective featuring Invader, Minel, TJ and others and “Boo” with a Jazz and Folk ensemble. Producer singer, songwriter Ace also had a wonderful set on Friday outdoing Ginuwine who followed him. The singer also featured Teri, Shani and Mr Vegas.

•   The Secret Band. The Folk group that seemed like they were on a Saint Lucia Jazz & Arts Festival tour was a hit with visitors and locals alike.

•    Headphunk on Thursday May 3 at the Rodney Bay Marina. What a setting, what a show, featuring poetry, spoken word and music and some first class original pieces!

•   Jazz in the South, at the Cultural Centre. This was an event of the highest quality and the introduction of theatre was well thought out. Emerson Nurse and the Meddy Gerville trio were also superb!

•    Fond D’or Jazz featuring Kassav, Barbara Cadet, The Secret band and others was the show that threatened to steal the thunder from many of the main-stage events—and maybe it just did.

•   Soundstage at Rodney Bay. Saint Lucian talent shone bright, What is needed now are some actual international talent scouts attending the event. Can someone please call Simon? Cowell, not Paul!

•  Hot Couture. With a name like that you knew there was bound to be controversy, right? Still, onstage it was almost flawless. The fashion show brought local designers and their regional counterparts together, as well as home and overseas-based Saint Lucian models doing their highly impressive entertaining thing.

• Jazz Showcase at Rodney Bay. For Jazz purists this was a joy and Etienne Charles and Fal Fwet proved the injection of some Creole and West Indian vibes into an international fare can be quite appetizing.

•  Arts at Pigeon Island. From visual arts to flash mob dancers, to performers on side stage, there was never a dull moment during the festival.

•  The O’ Jays. Never mind that during the advertising for the festival R&B powerhouse R. Kelly eclipsed these legends, nonetheless the O’Jays rocked with their old school jams like Money, Backstabbers, Love Train, She Used to Be My Girl and others.

The legendary O’Jays performed on Jazz Sunday.

•  We may not have realized it but we were part of history when the Jacksons reunited and came to Saint Lucia as their first and maybe only Caribbean stop. And yes, the brothers can still jam and did just that at Pigeon Island Friday.

The Jacksons’ tribute to Michael Jackson in st lucia will go down in history.

•  Brian Culbertson was my surprise performer on the final day. Did someone say white men can’t jump? This white boy was funky and boy, can he jump—and prance too.

•  Tito Puente, David Rudder, Robbie Greenidge on Saturday, May 11. Latin Jazz meets steel pan and Calypso. Phew! “Muy caliente,” is all I’ll say.

•  The Finale: R. Kelly. He is the king of R&B and more, for good reason. What a class performer. With more than fifty hit songs to his credit, some obviously had to be cut short or left out. But from his up-tempo jams to bed-room songs, ballads and classics such as the incredible I Believe I Can Fly, R. Kelly laced the icing on an already tasty Saint Lucia Jazz & Arts Festival cake.

R. Kelly’s performance closed off the 2013 Jazz Festival on the right note.

Did someone say more? I second that emotion!

Niagara College interns Emma and Jasmine.

Two students from Niagara College in Ontario, Canada, are in St Lucia on a 10-week internship programme.

The two, Emma Randall and Jasmine Simpson, are both second year students pursuing a  Bachelors’ degree in International Commerce and Global Development. The internship is intended to give them hands-on experience living and working in a developing country and imparting their knowledge and skills while learning in a dynamic work environment.

Emma is at the Saint Lucia Coalition of Service Industries while Jasmine is at the Holistic School of Massage Therapy. The internship was facilitated by Diane Girard of NEX Consulting who liased with Maxine Semple – Study and Work Abroad Advisor at Niagara College. The two were in touch with SLCSI Executive Director, Yvonne Agard, who made the logistical arrangements.

Niagara College is one of three campuses in the Ontario region. The other two are Welland (Health and Forensics) and Niagara on the Lake (Business and Culinary). The study programmes at Niagara College are predominantly International Commerce and Global Development with a large intake on international students from the Caribbean, Africa, Latin America and Asia. The three campuses have a combined population of roughly 9000 students.

Emma, who is 20, is excited about her internship. She said there are a few St Lucian students at Niagara College and they encouraged her to make the best of her stay on the island. Emma describes herself as “outgoing and personable” and one who loves to travel. She has been to South Africa, England and France. She enjoys meeting people and learning new cultures. Emma is hoping her stint in St Lucia will bridge the gap between “what we study and what we see, and how it applies in the real world.” She added: “I hope to apply what I’ve learnt to this internship and hopefully learn from it as well. I really want to see how business is done in a different country so that can help me grow.”

Emma hopes to become an entrepreneur, owning and managing her own business someday.

Jasmine, 21, is the more soft-spoken of the two interns. St Lucia is only her second trip abroad. Her first trip was to Mexico in February 2005.  She too is keen to learn new cultures and ways of doing business. Jasmine has been assigned to the St Lucia Holistic School of Massage Therapy – an area which she admits is relatively new to her but she’s keeping an open mind. She has studied market entry which will come in handy for this institution as it is on the verge of penetrating new markets within the OECS. Jasmine also has strong social media skills and is versed in programmes like PowerPoint and Prezi, which will come in handy in client presentations. She hopes to adapt very quickly to her new living and working environment.

Executive Director of the St Lucia Coalition of Service Industries, Yvonne Agard, said: “SLCSI is pleased to facilitate the internship of these two students. It’s part of our global reach as an organization. In the modern age of doing business, networking and strategic alliances are essential in opening new doors of opportunity. And so, we see this exchange as part of a process of growing our global network and building alliances which could serve us well in the future.”

Outside of their internship, Emma and Jasmine are looking forward to a truly wholesome St Lucian experience.

Does universal secondary education translate to equal opportunity for all?

At present everyone concerned about the future of education in St Lucia is aware of the academic underperformance of some of our secondary schools. This situation is even more evident in the case of new secondary schools built to effectuate universal secondary education. Progress in the form of new school plants seemed overshadowed by academic underperformance. This development has constructed a public perception of uncertainty where these schools are concerned thus making these new facilities appear cosmetic.

The recognition of a performance gap between new and established secondary schools, speaks to the existence of an education policy problem, which demands a government solution. It is into this environment of low performance that our political parties, Pegasus of school improvement – monetary subsidies to parents (as opposed to a sustainable economic and social intervention) come charging in. From a footnote in the political platforms, monetary subsidies have become the most welcome intervention of the millennium, particularly to the disadvantaged. The data bears me out, successive government administrations boast of thousands of dollars handed out to parents to compensate for secondary school students’ economic difficulties. The publicity of this input gives it the appearance of the centerpiece of compensatory efforts, although no empirical data exists to evaluate the educational output.

The reality is that the solution to academic underperformance is a great deal more than a political fancy. Obviously stakeholders can connect a public policy problem like school failure to either government action or inaction. Government therefore must dismiss all doubt that whatever policy it implements will not simply serve as an anesthetic but will have a real qualitative and quantitative influence on the problem. It is obvious that our new secondary schools though meeting the objective of facilitating universal access are underperforming academically, and it is not for lack of trying. The patchwork of interventions, e.g. child friendly schools, afterschool programmes, bus subsidies, etc. simply do not get to the root of the problem.  What went wrong? How did the framing of underachievement occur in the new secondary schools? Most prescriptions for school improvements seemed to have focused on more or less of the same – more monitoring and supervision of teachers, more contact time, more tests, less punitive interventions, more counseling programmes. Along with these prescriptions, cloaked in a common sense assessment of the new secondary schools’ under subscription and academic decline, Tech Voc education as a new curriculum agenda is presented as a necessity for broad school reform. All the while the consequences of honouring unregulated parental choice remained obscured. Notwithstanding the benefits of these reforms and prescriptions, overlooked in the alliance between universal access and the secondary school selection and placement method was the germ of the present environment of academic underperformance in new secondary schools — the composition of the student body.  As a result of this oversight the hope that new secondary schools could move to becoming analogues of the established secondary schools was soon shattered.

It is possible then to surmise that the distribution of students in secondary schools in terms of academic capital is skewed in a manner that will not promote the viability of new secondary schools. This summation points to the need to reengineer the secondary school selection and placement model, thereby reconstructing students’ experiences of it. To understand this assumption it is necessary to advert to what has happened in terms of reforms in the current secondary schools selection and placement model. One would discover that there was no significant shift in the secondary school selection and placement policy, from its inception leading up to the realization of universal secondary education. More specifically, there was no decisive policy shift to include an overt action for narrowing the academic performance gap between secondary schools. The current secondary school selection model tends to emphasize one extreme, choice, without its balancing perspective, regulation.

This logic is analogous to supplying high quality raw materials to factory A and low quality of the same materials to factory B and expecting the same high quality output from both. St Lucia’s educational milestone – USE and our educational showpiece – new secondary schools, have therefore not found easy acceptance among all, where the conversation encompasses academic performance, equity and labeling of secondary schools. Only the established schools with a tradition of academic excellence are spoken about with avidity by the public. Parental choice as a result is still shaped by the definitions these conversations imply. The transition towards USE without reforming the secondary school selection model can therefore be blamed for establishing a mirage of equity and choice.

Disconcerting as regulating secondary school selection may sound to some, a strategy must be found to include some high performing students into the new secondary schools. Nothing less than this intervention will narrow the performance divide between the new secondary schools and their established higher performing counterparts. This view does not detract from the recognition that the current prescriptions for school improvement have their merits. However, in schools where the majority of students are deficient in cultural capital and lack the academic prerequisites,  these prescriptions only tinker the edges of our nation’s failing schools problem.

Within the context of the present secondary school selection model, differences in school ratings by the public tend to surface along a range of insidiously institutionalized ascribed ranks. These ranks, now more than ever, are undeniably connected with the labels and the student composition of secondary schools. Any attempt to help underrated and undersubscribed schools gain academic muscle must therefore focus on the disequilibrium in the academic and cultural capital of our secondary school student population. Much has been done through Common Entrance Examinations to foster a climate of democracy in terms of access to secondary schools. More however must be done to avoid the apparent inescapability of inequitable student composition between secondary schools.  Educators and policy makers must cease being evasive. They must admit that the rating of one school over the other is obvious. They must admit that it has cultivated a built-in discrimination in society through its norms and actions which are the rules for school selection. These norms and actions inform parents and prospective students about which schools are successful.  The influence of the adepts of such norms is certainly a common denominator in structuring the self-fulfilling prophecy leading to underperformance in some secondary schools.

It is obvious that the trend in oversubscription to established secondary schools and the contraposition in the case of new secondary schools exists. We can surmise therefore that parental choice is instrumental in the structuring of inequitable student composition among secondary schools. This recognition therefore draws attention to the complexities in ensuring heterogeneity (in terms of academic prerequisite) of students assigned to secondary schools without regulating the secondary school selection process. The idea of meritocratic competition  among secondary schools is therefore challenged for want of a regulated secondary school selection and assignment model.

It can be argued that the current secondary school selection and assignment model extols the virtues of democracy and equality of opportunity. Nonetheless, it also raises the moral question of equity in terms of student composition among schools, which must compete and be evaluated as equals. Test scores and parental choice are the key determinants of access to secondary school. This being the case, the argument for meritocratic competition and comparison of secondary school performance within the current framework of secondary school selection suggests a rather ill fitting mosaic. It is the degree and reputation of academic capital that determines the power holders among secondary schools. The weaker the academic capital of a secondary school, the lower its ranking by the public. The public ranking and the insidious ranking by the Ministry of Education is evidenced by the article: Top Common Entrance achievers receive bursaries. (Top class Sept/Oct 2012) Notably all the top achievers’ first choices were the oversubscribed high performing secondary schools. Revealingly, school choice and labels are framed by the overall academic performance of the secondary schools. It can also be asserted that the academic performance and the consequential ranking and labels associated with these secondary schools act as market signals, which continue to influence parental choice. Thus the cycle of high performance of the established secondary schools is maintained. This cycle highlights how the impact of choice falls unevenly on new secondary schools. The perpetuation of this cycle also points to how policy makers tend to underestimate the impact of policies on people’s thinking and behaviour.

The Ministry of Education’s adherence to the view that secondary schools are not ranked even when parental choices suggest the contrary, is evidence of the above stated tendency on the part of policy makers. Maintenance of this view has constructed a secondary education system that is functional within a dysfunctional logic. The results of the CSEC examinations demonstrate the fallacy of the equality of academic status of secondary schools argument. The travails of our new schools are quite obvious. I however empathize with our policymakers. One must agree, admitting that schools are ranked is tantamount to speaking to the impact of the compositional effect of the student body. This admission would imply the labeling and ranking of schools and more specifically students by policymakers who do not want to present themselves to the public as segregationist. In this case policy makers are faced with an insoluble contradiction. Whipsawed by political expediency, reality and moral responsibility, the path of least resistance has been to present our secondary school system as egalitarian. Interestingly, this gives a curious side-light on the rationale for implementing partial zoning — a positive move intended to change the landscape of secondary school selection and student assignment.

Editor’s note: Look out for the continuation of this story in Saturday’s STAR Newspaper!

Yvonne Vittalis was an iPhone 5 winner, thanks to LIME eTopUp.

Yvonne Vitalis is the big winner in the latest online promotion from LIME. Between January and April this year, thousands of customers used the company’s online TopUp mechanism to buy credit for themselves, friends and family in Saint Lucia. Purchases in excess of US$15 qualified users for a chance to win a brand new iPhone 5 from LIME. Out of the thousands of users on the site, Yvonne came up the lucky winner.

“I am really surprised, pleased and excited about this,” said the forensic accounting professional. “I use the eTopUp feature on a regular basis, and it’s very useful and convenient. I knew about the promotion, but it was not at the forefront of my mind or anything, so I was very pleasantly surprised when I got the call with the good news, and I’ve been very anxious to get my hands on my new iPhone 5. Thanks, LIME!”

The iPhone 5 is the latest smartphone from Apple Inc. iPhone 5 features a larger display, a faster chip, the latest wireless technology, and an 8MP iSight camera, among other great new features. The handset is available from LIME for as little as $149 on applicable plans, but thanks to online TopUp, Yvonne was presented with hers just this week. And LIME was excited about making her a winner.

“We have so many ways for our prepaid customers to TopUp,” explained Laurencia Cadette, head of marketing & communications at LIME Saint Lucia. “Whether you’re on island or your want to buy credit for a Saint Lucia number, we have an option for you; you have Western Union, MoreMagic, online TopUp on the web or the LIME Saint Lucia Facebook page, or you can TopUp in store or at one of our hundreds of local vendors.”

With online TopUp, customers can add credit using a credit card or PayPal account, from the comfort of home, office, or even on the go using a handset profile. The latest online TopUp promotion from LIME offered 50 percent bonus credit on all transactions, plus the chance to win tickets to the Saint Lucia Jazz & Arts Festival on Mother’s Day.

Makeba Alcide (center) qualified for the World Championships in Moscow.

Arizona’s Brigetta Barrett stole the high jump headlines with a world-leading clearance of 1.99m at the recent PAC-12 championships, setting a collegiate record in the process of winning her third straight conference title.

Meanwhile, over in Columbia, Missouri, the South-eastern Conference championships continued with two Saint Lucians in women’s high jump, one of them an NCAA record holder in her own right.

On Sunday, indoor Pentathlon record holder Makeba Alcide won the heptathlon for the University of Arkansas and qualified to represent Saint Lucia at the World Championships in Moscow in August. Sunday, she was was facing off against a field that included fellow countrywoman Jeannelle Scheper, in the open women’s high jump.

Alcide, a senior, ended her competition at 1.80 metres (m), well below the 1.88 m school record and SEC meet record she set two days ago. But her mark was good enough for fifth overall, and the 23-year-old earned valuable points for the Razorbacks.

Scheper, a junior at the University of South Carolina, started her competition at 1.75m, and she was one of six women to clear on her first attempt. Along with Alcide, Scheper needed three tries at 1.80 m, but she eventually got the height. On the ensuing height 1.85 m, she went over on the first try. She was one of just three women over, guaranteeing her a top-three finish.

All three, however missed at 1.89 m and with a clean card up to 1.85 m, Georgia’s Saniel Atkinson Grier took the SEC title. Scheper, the only underclassman in the top five, was second on count back with Alabama’s Krystle Schade third. Alcide and Scheper will now prepare for next month’s National Collegiate Athletics Association Championships in Eugene, Oregon, and perhaps Saint Lucia’s National Championship also taking place in June.