SEN classrooms will be accessible in every region – Min Manickchand

With greater access to educational facilities, the Education Ministry continues to make provisions for students with Special Education Needs (SEN) across the nation.

During her budget presentation, Education Minister, Priya Manickchand reaffirmed the government’s commitment to improving the quality of life of persons with special education needs in schools across the region.

Minister Manickchand stated that “We plan to put a SEN classroom accessible in every region. So, there’s going to be more than one SEN classroom in every region. We also started, for the first time, a specialisation at CPCE [the Cyril Potter College of Education] where for the first time, they have teachers specialising in special education needs.”

In addition, the minister said some 303 teachers are registered under the programme.

This ties into the government’s agenda to ensure that more special education teachers are trained.

The objective is for the students to grow up to be active and successful adults who contribute to the development of society.

Currently, there are 13 SEN classrooms in the region.

This forms part of the President Ali-led Administration’s efforts of ensuring that all learners have equal access to educational opportunities in Guyana through policies, strategies, and resources. 

“We are going to make the Disability Centre that is at Turkeyen, the Caribbean Diagnostic and Treatment Centre which is how it was intended to be,” Minister Manickchand underlined.

The Regional Special Education Needs/Disability Diagnostic and Treatment Centre has the ability to identify each student’s unique learning difficulties and provide therapy and treatment to ensure that learning occurs. 

Just last month, the sod was turned for the construction of the aquatic therapy pool at the Regional Special Education Needs/Disability Diagnostic and Treatment Centre at CPCE’s Turkeyen Campus.

Some 200 learners are expected to benefit from this initiative from various special needs schools.

This is part of the government’s vision to have all teachers trained by 2025 in keeping with President, Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali’s world-class education vision.

To attain this, CPCE will be utilising a blended modality of in-house aptitude and online courses for trainee teachers.

The education minister also highlighted that, “CPCE is going to be able to, for the first time ever, graduate more than 2,500 students because of initiatives taken there to go fully, although not solely online, and have entered 1,893 students. Before, they could have only entered 500 students. We are going to have more teachers at a better quality.”

Over the last two years, 907 teachers have completed training.