Parents, teachers protest deplorable state of Santa Rosa school
Parents, teachers protest deplorable state of Santa Rosa school
– leaky roof, rotten floors, lack of ventilation among issues
Kaieteur News – Several teachers and parents of students of the Santa Rosa Primary School in Region One yesterday protested the deplorable condition that currently prevails at the school.
The Santa Rosa Primary School.
Kaieteur News understands that the school has been in a deplorable condition for a long time and nothing has been done to address it. Due to this, parents and some teachers became frustrated and held a protest action at the Region’s Administrative Office calling for the old existing building to be “renovated”.
The protest held outside the Education Office yesterday over the deplorable condition of the Santa Rosa Primary School
Speaking briefing with Kaieteur News yesterday about the situation, was chairperson of the school’s Parent Teacher Association, Ms. Donna Henry who stated that the “main reason for that protest is because of the deplorable state of the Santa Rosa Primary School building.” The chairperson told this publication that last week they held a PTA meeting with parents and raised concerns about the school. Flowing from the discussion at the meeting, they decided to take action yesterday. She mentioned that for months, the headmistress of the school would write in her monthly reports to the Regional Democratic Council (RDC) that the school is in dire need of repairs.
The current condition of the Santa Rosa Primary School in Region One. (Photos credit: Moruca DC)
According to Ms. Henry, what she learned was that there is a $19.5 million allocation put aside to repair the school, which the RDC promised to use to do the necessary renovation, but up to now nothing has been done. “We have some major issues there where there is major overcrowding of the school, we have some children admitted to register and they cannot attend school because the school doesn’t have space for them. Another issue is that the building is a very, very old building – the floors are rotten, we have a serious heat problem that resulted because the building does not have ceiling and there is no proper ventilation,” she explained.
According to Ms. Henry just before schools reopened earlier this month, some minor repairs were done to the building by the RDC. She added that what had prompted them was that the school’s officials had planned not to open the school if the issues were not fixed.
