Jamaica needs teachers, yet England poaches them and classrooms lie empty. How can that be right?

By ⁦AUGUSTINE JOHN⁩

🧵 theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

“Does it matter if we in England are recruiting teachers so heavily in Jamaica that classrooms there don’t have enough of them? Ask those who run school systems in the Caribbean that desperately need their brightest and best. People will always want to be mobile.” 2/

“By choosing to recruit Jamaican teachers as “the right kind of immigrants” to help solve England’s teacher shortage, the government and its academies are failing to pay sufficient regard to the experience of teachers generally – homegrown Black teachers in particular –“ 3/

“and the political context of schooling and race.

What expectations do employers have of the workload Jamaican teachers would be expected to carry? How do they deal with situations in which new teachers’ experiences translate into management practices and decision-making” 4/

“that may conflict with the culture of an English school? How will they fare in #academies that exclude disproportionate numbers of Black students, given the community’s continuing concern about wasteful, discriminatory and destructive #SchoolExclusions ?” 5/

“What’s needed is not a poaching exercise, but a change of mindset.

In 2015, David Cameron offered the Jamaican government £25m to build a new prison.“ 6/

“Rather than facilitating Jamaica to lock up its “foreign nationals” serving time in British jails and awaiting deportation, the country should acknowledge its historical responsibility for the state of Jamaica’s schools and the lack of opportunity for its school leavers,” 7/

“England, meanwhile, has every right to operate in its own interests. It has never done otherwise, and will happily denude the former colony of its qualified and experienced teaching force, whom it played no part in schooling and training.” 8/

“England has taken unthinkable amounts from the Caribbean, and it still does so.”

The sick irony of bringing Black Caribbean teachers to #HostileEnvironment into a system that continues to disproportionately exclude Black Caribbean children.

#NoMoreExclusions