On Monday, 7News showed you the fiery response from the Belize National Teacher's Union who were upset with the comments from Minister of Education Patrick Faber.
We've dealt mostly with that, so we thought that the back and forth between both sides would end there. Well, Minister Faber was one of the keynote speakers at the 2013 PSE Awards and he used that platform to respond their response.
He told the gathering that his message was mistranslated in delivery:
Hon. Patrick Faber - Minister of Education
"I do this not to provoke further reaction from anyone, I do so for the sake of clarity and so that the message is not lost. Here are the main points of what I have to say. That it is everybody's business to fix the problems with the PSE and we all have roles to play, schools and their managements and proprietors need to take ownership for their performance and the quality of education they are doing. Schools need to self evaluate and develop and implement school improvement plans, managing authorities need to support their schools in this and where necessary apply pressure for improvement. Parents and guardians need to be involved in the education of their children, they need to examine how the school is doing and support and where necessary - apply pressure for the school to improve. The teacher's union need to promote and assist with the professionalization of teaching services through helping to uphold the highest standard in the profession of any professional organization should. Lastly the Ministry of Education needs to analyze system performance nationally and inform decision making and we need to provide both support to and pressure managing authorities on schools, teachers and even parents to improve. Pressure and support - those are the two words I want you to hold dear right now. Parents pressure the schools, parents pressure the teachers, parents pressure the management, parents pressure the Ministry of Education. Teachers pressure your ma management, teachers pressure your parents but not only pressure, support as well."
But there were parts of his response which didn't deal with some of the issues the BNTU raised, so we asked him to comment directly on them:
Hon. Patrick Faber
"I understood that they took personal some of the things that I brought up, even they took it personal that it was I who was the messenger. I really don't wish to get into a back and forth - I think those who spoke at the Union's press conference who said that we're really partners and that we should put our shoulders to the wheel together to make education better in this country - I am all on board with that. I say to them that that must come with different stakeholders being able to call out, being able to pressure the other stakeholder group and as well give them support. If you check the facts, if you check our history of the Ministry under my leadership, you will see that that is what we're all about. We want everybody to do their part, the managements, the parents, the teachers, the union, the Ministry - everybody has a role to play and that was the whole focus of my presentation at the press conference that the Ministry held. I did not cast blame in any one corner as some have put it to be."
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