Listening to and acting on input will be essential components for a meaningful community-led plan for Bermuda’s public education system, according to stakeholders.

Education minister Cole Simons last week announced an initiative in the House of Assembly that will call upon “the entire community in Bermuda to join with the Board of Education” to be a part of the planning process.

American-based education expert Jeremiah Newell, who has “significant experience in designing and leading strategic planning processes for public school systems” has been hired to help develop a plan Mr Simons said as he updated MPs on progress in his ministry.

Mr Simons said the planning approach includes: training volunteers for community facilitators; identifying community leaders to serve as hosts for community conversations; authentic community engagement through small group, community-held conversations; administering a survey to gather island-wide community input on public education and; establishment of an Ambassador Design Team, a diverse group of strategic planning writers. The plan follows several reports over the course of 20 years focusing on improving the public school system including the Hopkins Report, Mincy Report and, more recently, the School Reorganisation Report.

PTA president at West Pembroke School, Danielle Riviere, who plans to get involved with the recently announced Parent Involvement Committee, said that the Government would have to work hard to gain trust from the public that their input will be valued and acted upon.

She told The Royal Gazette: “Historically, input has not been used. I understand why they are trying to do it but there are other issues that need to be dealt with before the community will trust any process of input. There is some historical baggage that has to be recognised, dealt with and acknowledged before the community will readily engage in the way that they are asking. There will be pockets of people who will engage but the widespread engagement that they are looking for may be difficult to conjure up.”

According to Mr Simons, the ministry has already received some 200 responses to an online survey is currently available on the Ministry of Education website at www.moed.bm

Ms Riviere said: “It is a start but it will always come down to what they do with the information — information gathering for the sake of information gathering and engagement for the sake of engagement isn’t worth much. Utilising it and creating a system that reflects what the people want is a totally different deliverable that it will be interesting to see.”

Mary Lodge, principal at St George’s Preparatory School, said that the initiative could help to identify the reasons why many are opting to keep their children out of government schools and instead spending tens of thousands of dollars to have them educated privately.

Ms Lodge, who has 39 years experience working in the Bermuda education system, added: “It is absolutely a good idea at the end of the day we are educating people’s children and grandchildren and next door neighbour ... The more the community is involved the better. Until we actually know what the fears are and can address them directly, we won’t get anywhere.

“I have for the last two years invited the principal of Clearwater Middle School Keisha Douglas and her team come to talk to the PTA and she says ‘I can’t fix a problem if you don’t tell me what you are afraid of’. We have had some fabulous conversations in the room. When she came back the second time I was tremendously proud of her as she was able to say that she had heard a particular concern and here is how we have done things differently.”

Ms Lodge spoke specifically about a new looping system where teachers are able to spend a longer period of time with their middle school students. “That is just one example of many where a solution has come out of a conversation with the parents. We need to expose more people to what is actually going on in the public education system.”

Among the priorities for the public education system, according to Ms Lodge, would be an effort to prepare Bermuda’s students for 21st-century jobs.

“Nobody would have suggested that the incredible rapid improvement in technology. These are digital children. The infrastructure that the schools ought to have to support them is something that we need to address and how do we teach them.”

Kelland Hayward, PTA president at Dellwood Middle School, pointed to what he sees as a lack of action to implement the recommendations in the Blueprint for Reform in Education following the Hopkins Report of 2007. The plan highlighted several “strategic priorities” to be implemented during the period of 2010 to 2015, including: improving the quality of teaching and education in the classroom; strengthening leadership; facilitating the improvement of standards via accountability and transparency; improving efficiency of delivery and improving the culture and climate of government schools.

Its first recommendation was to implement an internationally recognised curriculum that is externally assessed which was achieved through the introduction of the Cambridge Curriculum in 2010.

Mr Hayward told The Royal Gazette<./i>: “You have a five-year strategic plan based on the report. Five years later there was absolutely no feedback report follow-up on accountability and responsibility. The next thing, let’s put together a five-year strategic plan involving the public. The Ministry of Education’s bottom line would be a follow-up on the Blue Print on Reform in Bermuda plan.

“2015 went by and nobody said nothing. Lots of time and energy went into that plan. Why would you start a whole new strategic plan after you just finished one and nothing was said or followed through with it.

“If they can tell me who is going to be held responsible and how they will be made accountable if this fails, I might be inclined to get involved again. It is a waste of time I have been finding.”

A principal at a local primary school who did not want to be named, said: “I think it is a good idea but I think that it is good for everyone. The children we educate are everybody’s children and they will have a lasting impact on society and culture.

“It needs to be a collaborative effort and if everyone is just talking — the children come first.

“We can go back and forth about what we think should happen but we are preparing the children for careers that have not even been invented. It is important that they get the basics and that we are all moving and working together.”