Secret Criteria and the Medal

Offered in response to this article in the Guardian.

The recent concerns expressed about the criteria for being awarded the President’s Medal and that of CXC’s Dennis Irvine Award provide further justification of the need for more transparent selection processes everywhere in education and in political life, as well as the need for a more critical, reflective and informed public. I mean to take nothing away from the remarkable performance under trying circumstances by Nicholas Sammy, especially when so few men are being held up as academic role models, but quite simply the two awards are from two different organizations with differing philosophies and stakeholders and designed for entirely different purposes each with its own selection criteria. In both cases it is likely that the award is based on a sum and not an average score.

In the case of the President’s Medal it is likely a total score based on performance in eight (8) Units, including Caribbean Studies and Communication Studies, over two consecutive years, i.e. three (3) Unit1 and three (3) Unit2. This makes the Medal open to ALL students from T&T completing the minimum requirements for a full CAPE certificate in the required time period. Where a student does additional Units one would hope that their best six Units in three subjects (in addition to the Communication and Caribbean Studies) would be considered. By pursuing additional Units he likely did not maximise his scores on those Units that would eventually be considered in awarding the Medal. This will likely be the eventual explanation for the government’s “failure to award” Nicholas the Medal. Simple economics (not one of the Units he studied).

Now on to CXC’s Dennis Irvine Award. CXC, as I have argued before, is a for-profit business. It is in their interest to promote their testing products and to elect, brand, and promote admirable spokespersons such as Mr. Sammy, who have used their product in excess to success as exemplifying, ‘The Most Outstanding CAPE Candidate Overall.’ Here the award is not based on pursuing and succeeding in a minimum number of Units but rather the maximum utilization and ‘enjoyment’ of their product/brand – this year 14 Units. A similar award is made at CSEC Level and the winner likely also has something like 12-16 distinctions at CSEC.

The President’s Medal and CXC’s Awards are based on two different standards and criteria and serve two different purposes and constituencies. Despite the media`s mamaguay it is no real mystery as to why one could be awarded one and not the other. One reason we and Nicholas have heard relatively little of CXC’s Award is that the payoff in the short-term for individuals is negligible as compared to that of the Medal which, encouraged by uncritical journalistic practices, has achieved its own mythic status in our academic culture. The annual return on investment for CXC though is increased and unquestioned brand loyalty from regional governments and perhaps more students across the Caribbean being encouraged (by parents, teachers, competitiveness and media attention) to pursue more Units. ‘Ka-ching’!

The sense of outrage and injustice, both real and media manufactured, done to Mr. Sammy and Mr. Jaikaransingh, the Principal of Presentation College, San Fernando, soon to be branded ‘CXC School of the Year’, speaks to an as yet unsatisfied desire in our society for increased transparency, accountability and oversight in managing selection processes at ALL levels and in ALL spheres where valuable social goods involving the public purse are at stake such as the award of (secret) scholarships, contracts, or privileged entry into secondary schools. The promise of ‘New Politics’ demands nothing less. Indeed, while we are hurt by this perceived injustice done to a single ‘son-of-the-soil’ we are not so moved, and there is nary a peep from any Principal of any prestige school, when he/she legally disenfranchises a significant number of other people’s children, our sons and daughters, who have legitimately and legally earned places at mainly tax-payer financed schools under the anachronism that continues to be allowed by the Concordat. Our government assisted schools too perhaps have ‘secret’ criteria for admissions that go beyond simply ‘belonging’ to the right religious denominations.
Imagine what would happen if in addition to the names of students and the schools passed for the newspapers published students’ scores on SEA. The whole of Trinidad and Tobago would be in an uproar when they saw the same questionable selective principles operating as students with lower percentages were admitted to a prestige school ahead of other students with higher scores. There is an obvious reason this is not done – it would upset the way things are. Questions must also be raised and answers sought to the `uncertainties` surrounding selection criteria as to how individual students are admitted into 6th form and how some transfers are effected when others are denied. If some Principals of prestige schools are feeling a little uncomfortable, then I’ve done my job.

As a friend of mine related to me, we cannot only demand the truth and selection criteria when it is favourable to us. That we see no problem with agitating for transparency in one situation but keeping a studied silence in another analogous situation is telling. We cannot have one set of standards for some and another set for others if the game and its outcomes are to be claimed to be fair and just for all. We cannot demand full disclosure only for those powerfully placed and their agents. We must ask after that which continues to take place behind closed doors with and without our continued legal blessings and who benefits and who is disadvantaged and how. We are all complicit in the annual injustices meted out by successive and successful educational establishments. If our selection processes do not pass ethical scrutiny they must be abandoned and rethought. The door has been unlocked for students who have superior marks and who are not selected for the school of their choice to likewise demand a public justification from the Principals of Prestige Schools as to why they ‘failed to be awarded’ a place.

In closing I offer some final, more personal, messages. To Nicholas, Naipaul’s description is apt, “the world is what it is” and by and large it is not fair. If an injustice has been done to you I hope it will come to light and be corrected. Congratulations and I hope you commit yourself to fighting with the same spirit against those more common injustices inflicted upon and which manifest themselves day-to-day and year-to-year upon those who have not been as privileged as you and I. To the Principals of the Prestige schools I ask that they with one voice and in a singular act of altruism end the continued violence and injustice done to the nation’s children via the 20% selection mechanism. Note this does not mean abandoning the Concordat only this unjust element. To the Ministry of Education, don’t get played by the media or the Prestige schools. Don’t pander to public pressure and rush in to redress this perceived injustice without serious consideration and deliberation. Please do it right and make it fair the first time!