April a difficult month for nation’s schools – MOEY’s Troupe
Published:Thursday | May 2, 2024 | 12:05 AMAlbert Ferguson/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
RICHARD TROUPE, director of safety and security in the Ministry of Education and Youth (MOEY), says April has been the most difficult month with regard to violence in schools.
Troupe, who was part of the education and youth ministry’s trauma team providing counselling for students at Grange Hill High School in Westmoreland on Monday, noted the number of children who were either shot or stabbed to death by their peers and/or by external criminals within the wider society since April 1.
“Students, I don’t know about you, but ... the month of April, it has been a difficult month for our nation’s schools,” Troupe told grade-10 students who are mourning the death of their fellow student, 16-year-old Carson Barrett.
He said violent activities involving students are rapidly finding a place in schools, and if they are to be corrected, it will largely depend on how quickly violence in the Jamaican society is addressed.
Barrett was shot and killed last Thursday by gunmen travelling on a motorcycle.
The Westmoreland Police Division reported that on April 25, two men opened gunfire on Barrett and a female student along Belle Isle Road in the parish.
The report said that both students had just left school and were walking along the roadway when they were pounced upon by two suspects travelling on a motorcycle. The motorcycle stopped and the pillion disembarked with a gun in his hand and opened gunfire at both victims, who ran in different directions.The female student was also shot and injured. She is recovering.
In another incident, Raniel Plummer, a 15-year-old student of Irwin High School in St James, was stabbed to death by his 14-year-old schoolmate. The St James police reported that Plummer was stabbed in his chest on April 17 about 3 p.m., when he was approached at the school gate by the accused, along with a group of boys, who reportedly attacked him.
The police added that during the squabble, a knife was brought into play and used to stab Plummer in the chest.
And 17-year-old Rushawn Rowe, otherwise called ‘Papa’, who was a student at Gaynstead High School and of a Harriman Close, Kingston 6 address, was shot while travelling on a motorcycle on April 23.
Troupe cautioned that while schools do not have control over the shooting death of anyone, students must take extreme care in choosing persons with whom they associate, in order to minimise the possibility of being targeted or caught in a crossfire.
“We have to be careful of the choices that we make, and as young people you have to be careful of the friends you keep, as ‘birds of a feather flock together’,” Troupe warned.
Officials from the MOEY, led by Region 4 Director Dr Michelle Walden-Pinnock, provided counselling through its trauma team for students and staff at both Grange Hill High and the Peggy Barry Primary schools.
Eight-year-old Jahmiel Richardson of Peggy Barry Primary perished in a house fire in Top Lincoln community on Friday night.
Trevine Donaldson-Lawrence, principal of Grange Hill High School, said some level of normality is expected to return to school today, given the intervention.
“I believe our students and staff have responded well to the counselling they received; and as we look forward to having normal classes, we want to continue the process to strengthen their resolve,” Donaldson-Lawrence told The Gleaner. “But by all indications, it seems as if we are on par to resume normal classes on Tuesday.”
She promised to extend counselling sessions to parents and guardians of her students.
“On Wednesday, we will be having parent-support sessions and will be broadening our counselling sessions to our ancillary staff, as we seek to pull every member of our school family together.”