First-of-its-kind St George’s School of Sciences opens

The first-of-its-kind, science-based learning school opened on Monday in Guyana. Two years after the St George’s High School was destroyed by a fire, the school was rebuilt and renamed the St George’s School of Sciences.

Minister of Education Priya Manickchand on Monday visited the school for its orientation and revealed that only 85 children have been enrolled. She also announced that the school will be “twinned” with Queen’s College, one of Guyana’s top secondary schools.

“We are twinning the schools, they are separate physically but if I took each and every one of your children and put them at Queen’s College, they will come excelling,” the minister said.

She added that this specialised school “will have the specialised support and we have brought in a team of teachers and they too will twin with QC.”

The students attending the new school should have scored at least 80 per cent in English, 65 per cent in Science and 60 per cent in Mathematics to be eligible for the school.

“Those are strong grades, I could take those grades and put them in any disciplined environment and produce doctors and lawyers and scientists,” Minister Manickchand stated.

But whether the children succeed will be up to the teachers and parents, Manickchand noted.

The school is equipped with smart classrooms and laboratories.

There are a set of specific rules that must be enforced and followed for students to continue learning there.

“If you are repeatedly coming late and we can’t help you to come early, we gotta help you to find another school, because you are going to disrupt what we want to do here. If you are repeatedly failing to turn in you work, we can’t throw you out the school system but we will find another school,” Manickchand warned the students and parents present at the orientation.

Once a child is late or absent their parents will immediately get a notification.

Each student on Monday received a laptop computer and starting next week, each child will be provided with breakfast.

“I want them to learn differently, I don’t want them to sit down whole half day and copy notes, I want the notes to be sent to their device so that they could read it the night before so when we come into class, we are discussing it,” Minister Manickchand highlighted.

Children who needs assistance will also be asked to come in to the school on Saturdays or stay back extra hours

“I would like to see each child go through this school and I am speaking to teachers without lessons, because it happened in the classroom,” Manickchand said while adding that tutoring can be implemented.

To combat having children attend extra lessons, a special schedule will be implemented at the school. This Manickchand explained will see some days using a 8:00 hrs to 16:00 hrs schedule instead of 09:00 hrs to 15:00 hrs.

“The reason we wanted the 8AM to 4PM is because if your child has extra needs, with particular topics, that we gotta hit that out now not wait till we reach fifth form. We gotta put in the extra time, but the school cannot drop that on you it has to be scheduled.”

Manickchand also said each child must be exposed to at least one musical instrument, a sport, one foreign language and one TVET subject along with volunteering opportunities.

“Those are the things that make for a resume that Harvard wants, that UWI wants it is not just 20 subjects, it’s all those other things,” the education minister said.

Meanwhile, the school’s Head teacher, Kevin Williamson encouraged parents to get to know the curriculum to know how to guide their children and get to know the teachers and work together to develop their child.

“As we journey together what you can look forward to, is a holistic opportunity for your child to develop both academically, socially and nationally for the development for not just this institution, not just for themselves but in order for them to be better citizens for this nation.”