incensed by the Education Minister's claim that no qualified Bermudians applied for a vacant school psychologist post.

Shadow Education Minister Miss Jennifer Smith yesterday said the three, who are school psychometrists, complained to her after reading Education Minister the Hon. Gerald Simons' comments in The Royal Gazette earlier this week.

Mr. Simons, responding to questions from Miss Smith in the House of Assembly last Friday, said no qualified Bermudian teachers or non-Bermudian teachers on employment contracts applied to fill seven posts which have been offered to non-Bermudians who will be recruited from abroad for the next school year.

Among the positions Mr. Simons referred to was that of school psychologist left vacant since Dr. Guy Fowle's departure last year.

The post calls for someone with a PhD in psychology.

Psychometrists are trained to measure mental ability. But Miss Smith said while the three Bermudian applicants did not have a doctorate in psychology, they worked under Dr. Fowle and carried out tasks which would normally be done by a psychologist.

She also noted that Dr. Fowle did not have a doctorate in psychology and neither does the present school psychologist.

The three psychometrists each serve an average of 3,600 pre-school to secondary school students throughout the Island, expressed concern that foreign psychologists have difficulty relating to students because of cultural differences.

She warned that having counsellors who cannot culturally identify with Bermudian students, such as mistaking the wearing of a stocking cap to keep one's hair in place as a sign of homosexuality, or misunderstanding Bermudian expressions, can cause serious repercussions.

"They (the psychometrists) noted that the majority of children who have problems in school do not have academic problems,'' Miss Smith said. "Most of the time it is social or family problems which impact on them.'' If there is a need to hire anyone, it would be a clinical psychologist, she said.

"We're not dealing with prevention. We're responding to incidents and crises,'' she said, adding that often students' problems go unnoticed for long periods of time because there are only three psychometrists and one school psychologist to deal with all students in the school system.

"The problem is the Ministry does not understand or give credence to the value of psychological analysis,'' Miss Smith said.

"All students should be tested (at all levels) to show their strengths and weaknesses and those weaknesses should be worked on.'' This was echoed by one parent who yesterday said she had to take her 14-year-old son to Boston because he had learning problems which had been ignored by teachers.

The woman, who noticed her son's learning disability when he was in primary school, said: "Over the years I kept asking them to hold him back. But they kept passing the buck and passing him.

"When I got him tested up there (Boston), I found out that he should be at the Primary Six grade level''.

Noting that Government does not offer any summer tutoring, she has purchased a "Back to Phonics'' programme in the US and is hoping to secure private tutoring for her son before the new school year begins.

Mr. Simons could not be reached for comment yesterday.