Children with cancer being taught in hospital

GINA, GUYANA, Wednesday, September 28, 2016

The Ministry of Education is helping children suffering from cancer to continue their education.

Chief Education Officer (ag), Ministry of Education, Marcel Hudson, recently told the Government Information Agency (GINA) that the Ministry, with support from the Perwinkle Club, provides two teachers who work with cancer patients in the Children Wards of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation.

This intervention is among several that the Ministry is undertaking to ensure children with special needs are educated, Hudson said.

According to Hudson there is a unit at the National Center for Educational Resource Development (NCERD) that addresses Special Education Needs (SEN). She said the unit provides testing for dyslexia. It also provides instructions on the needs of these students and on how the Ministry can support.

In addition, the Ministry has also been working with the Ministry of Health to screen students at an early age, for hearing and seeing disabilities that may hinder their performance in the school system. Hudson said that the ministry has been supplying the spectacles and hearing aids to children who need these aids. The ministry has also provided the David Rose School for the disabled with a bus take the students to and from home to school.

Hudson explained that the Ministry has been working to ensure that children with various disabilities have equitable access to education. “These children have the potential, it is just that they have some mitigating circumstances. That does not mean that an avenue or outlet should not be provided for them to be successful in life,” Hudson said.

The government has been working to reform the education system so as to better prepare them to play an active role in Guyana’s development.

By: Macalia Santos