The Necessity for Evidence-Based Education Reform in Barbados
Garry Hornby （ Institute of Education, University of Plymouth, UK ）
Marcia Pilgrim
Abstract
Long-term concern about the poor academic outcomes and violent behaviour in schools in Barbados have led to calls for reform of the education system with proposals recently being made by the Ministry of Education and many citizens with experience of the education system. In the main these proposals are not based on sound research evidence for which interventions will have a significant positive impact on the education system. This article outlines eight components of proposed education reform that are based on evidence from the field of educational psychology that highlight policies found in the international research literature to underpin effective education systems. These are: creating community secondary schools serving their local primaries; opening a small number of sixth form colleges; implementing comprehensive policy and procedures for the education of children with special educational needs; ensuring effective parental involvement at all levels of the education system; ensuring rigorous initial and ongoing teacher education at the pre-primary, primary and secondary levels; modernising all primary and secondary school buildings and classrooms; adding vocational options to the secondary school curriculum; re-focusing teaching at primary schools on ensuring all pupils develop adequate literacy and numeracy skills for them to be successful at secondary school.
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Copyright © 2024 Garry Hornby, Marcia Pilgrim
Publishing time:2024-02-29
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
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