Hello. My name is Leonard Robinson. I am the Curriculum Specialist with responsibility for the modern foreign languages at the Ministry of Education. I am also responsible for in-service teacher training, the MOE’s interlocutor for educational cooperation with the French- and Spanish-speaking world, hence my involvement with the Caribbean Observatory of School Climate (OCCS).
I have been collaborating with the INSPE, formerly ESPE, since 2017 when its first cohort of students came to Saint Lucia to conduct a comparative study of practices between Martinique and Saint Lucia in the field of Education. We had the pleasure of welcoming a second cohort in October 2019 and are preparing to receive a third, if all goes well, in February 2020. Over the years, the research projects have covered a broad spectrum of topics ranging from teaching and learning, to discipline and guidance counselling.
School climate is a broad area, and as such, students may wish to focus on areas such as:
- The school in the community: its effect on the community, its promotion of certain communal values and its effectiveness
- The school-home relationship
- School culture
- Student life
- Discipline at school, school organisational structure and interpersonal relationships (balance of power…)
- The quality of the teaching and learning experiences
In order to mitigate some of the school climate related issues, the Ministry of Education, in collaboration with its partner agencies, has put in place a few programmes, including the Child-friendly school programme (CFS), a UNICEF initiative, the school feeding programme, the textbook rental programme for disadvantaged primary school students, as well as the provision of guidance counsellors at all secondary schools and at the district level for primary school students.
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