By Prior Beharry
THE Office of the President (OTP) is not involved in the nomination or selection of people who receive national awards.
This was stated in a release from the OTP on Saturday.
It comes after outcry and the threat of legal action by the parents of two students who were top performers in the 2020 Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) exams.
San Fernando Trinidad Muslim League pupil Ameerah Beekhoo was celebrated as the student with the highest marks in October 2020 when results for the exams were announced. She had passed for her first choice of Naparima Girls’ High School.
However, Maria Regina Grade School student Aaron Subero had his marks reviewed and the results put him as the top student of the exam. He also passed for his first choice of Fatima College.
President Paula-Mae Weekes planned to give the medals for top secondary and primary school students on Monday.
The Chief Education Officer of the Ministry of Education Lisa Henry-Davis told Aaron’s parents and school (based on his revised marks) that he would have been the one to get the gold medal and therefore Ameerah was told that she would have received the silver.
Ameerah’s parents threatened legal action and that decision was rescinded and she was told again that she would receive the gold medal.
On Friday, Aaron’s parents also threatened legal action and the ministry decided on Saturday that both pupils will receive the gold medals.
Minister of Education Nyan Gadbsy-Dolly said outside the Parliament on Friday that it was the policy of her ministry to recognise the top performers of SEA based on preliminary results.
She said that students who passed for their first choice do not ask for review as was the case with Aaron.
Gadbsy-Dolly said the mix up was due to the unauthorised action of an official in her ministry. She said she was exploring her options regarding that official.
The minister also hinted that celebrating the top performers of SEA may be a thing of the past as it was an exam to place students in secondary school.
The release of the OTP stated:
Given the queries and comments by the public and media around such awards, there might be misunderstanding of the role of the Office of the President in these matters. We take this opportunity to explain.
In Trinidad and Tobago there are several award ceremonies hosted by the President e.g. The National Awards, the President’s Medal Awards, in which she confers the awards to the recipients.
In no instance and at no time is the Office of the President involved in the nomination and/or selection of the persons who eventually receive these awards.
The Office of the President simply receives the names of the persons to be awarded from the relevant authority, issues invitations to a presentation ceremony hosted by the President at which she confers (presents the recipients with) the awards.
The Office of the President has no knowledge of the persons who are selected unless and until we are provided with their names by the deliberating body.
These ceremonies are usually held annually. However over the past two years the timing has not been regular and the Office of the President has kept in touch with the relevant authorities to ascertain when we would be supplied with the names of the recipients of the various awards so that we could schedule the presentation ceremonies.
