December 2010


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Valedictorian

Go forth as dreamers and innovators

Erle Wright

If you are a student with family responsibilities and a job, you have to learn how to negotiate within the home to get support for your programme. Things will change around the house, and family members will feel you are neglecting them as you juggle work and study demands.

Erle Wright, valedictorian for the Faculty of Humanities and Education, dealt with all of those issues (and will continue as he pursues his MEd) and has some advice for students in similar circumstance.

“Learn to prioritize, know what is important and what is not,” he says. “Deal with perceptions of neglect quickly, honestly and openly. Gain the support of all members of the family. Spend quality time with them. Talk to them about what you are experiencing and make time to listen to them and their problems.”

Erle, who has been a teacher for more than 31 years, has two children, Michelle and Stephen, both of whom have graduated from The UWI, and knows what it is like to be on the degree treadmill, both as a parent and a student. With encouragement from his wife, Cheryl, he decided to return to studying to reduce the lethargy induced by the empty nest, and to “retool in order to keep abreast of modern learning theories and approaches in education.”

At 56, he didn’t find it too difficult to adapt, as he found that the “School of Education caters to teachers’ professional development and thus age is not really an impediment to success.”

As an educator, he has a thirst for knowledge, telling his graduating class, “I must reject all barren conceptions of learning. …I do not make reference to those lifeless, mindless, sterile, quickly forgotten ideas, hurriedly crammed into our minds to pass exams. I am not speaking about those notions of self-importance, which we often imprudently and impudently arrogate to ourselves because we surmise we now “know.” He said it was about “enduring understandings” which contribute to development. “The education we have received should be to us a living, growing entity because we have learned how to learn.”

With his years of experience within the education system, Erle felt he wanted to get more involved in administration.

“Doing the BEd was precipitated by my perception of the sorry state of school administration and education in Trinidad. I am not sure however, whether the BEd has alleviated or heightened my distress over the present state of affairs in the field of Education. It would appear the without a fresh vision, the present policies, direction and archaic hierarchical structures will continue to drive the education system into the quagmire of despair.”

Erle is now pursuing the MEd with concentration in Youth Guidance at UWI, and perhaps by the time he is finished, there will be more optimism.

Photography by PIPS