Teachers Call in Sick at Lester Vaughan School Amid Environmental Concerns

By Sheria Brathwaite

For the second straight day teachers at The Lester Vaughan School called in sick, disrupting teaching and learning amid complaints of environmental issues.

The Barbados Union of Teachers (BUT) said it was still trying to find out what led teachers to be off the job at the Cane Garden, St Thomas School.

While the union president Rudy Lovell said he could not go into much detail at the time, he confirmed that age-old problems at the school appeared to be resurfacing, adding that he will visit the school on Friday.

However, a source connected to the school told Barbados TODAY that about 25 teachers were off the job on Thursday, following a sick out by 30 teachers the previous day which led to the school closing early.

The school did not close early on Thursday.

At St Giles Primary School, members of the BUT executive visited the Ivy, St Michael primary school to investigate the issues that led to 20 of 28 teaching staff calling in sick on Wednesday.

Lovell said that initial discussions with the BUT members did not materialise and a decision was made to have a lunchtime meeting.

He added that while the executive was leaving the compound it was “threatened with eviction” which was “a violation of the Trade Union Act”.

After speaking to the staffers at lunch, Lovell reported that he could not divulge what the issues were as the union had yet to report them to the Ministry of Education.

Insisting that he had to follow protocol, he said that a report would be given to the ministry next Tuesday following another meeting with the workers the day prior.

“There are a number of concerns that the staff have raised and . . . we are not going to share the concerns with the public before we share them with the ministry. It would not be proper industrial relations practice. The ministry should not be hearing about the concerns through the media but directly from the union. We are still compiling the information as we only got to meet with the staff for an hour (Thursday). Next week after meeting with them again, we would put in writing what the issues are to the ministry,” he said, adding that the concerns were “genuine and significant enough to make a person not want to be on the compound”.

The BUT leader said the full staff complement was at the school during the visit as the workers were committed to ensuring that the teaching and learning process was not disrupted while the union intervened in the matter.

On Wednesday, several ancillary workers were also off the job and officials of the National Union of Public Workers (NUPW) visited the school.

NUPW Deputy General Secretary Wayne Walrond told reporters that the union also had initial problems trying to meet with the staff and made clear that under the Trade Union Act, there were provisions for union delegates to investigate matters involving its membership and they should not encounter red tape in carrying out industrial relation matters.