THE EDITOR: The Ministry of Education notes the dangerous, inaccurate and misleading assertions made in a letter to the editor, published on Friday. The writer takes issue with the choice of schools visited by the ministers and team in the Port-of-Spain Education District on September 27. In order to support a jaundiced premise, "Wrong schools visited," the author chose to selectively reference only five of the schools visited, while deliberately omitting the names of the other five.

The ministry’s media release and social media posts published on the same day of the visit provides pictorial evidence of all ten schools visited, which were Tranquillity Government Primary, Piccadilly Government Primary, Bishop Anstey High School, Moulton Hall Primary, St Rose’s Girls RC Primary as well as Newtown Boys RC Primary, Newtown Girls RC Primary, Holy Name Convent, Rosary Boys RC Primary and St Mary’s College.

The ministry also wishes to remind the writer and the national public that this was not the ministers’ first visit to schools in the PoS District. On March 29, the Education Ministers and team visited Diego Martin North Secondary, Diego Martin Central Secondary, St Anthony's College, Sixth Form Government, Mucurapo West Secondary, Mucurapo East Secondary, Fatima College, Woodbrook Secondary, Tranquillity Secondary and South East Port of Spain.

The ministers and team, on June 21, also visited Russell Latapy Secondary, Barataria North and South Secondary, Malick Secondary, Malick Girls' RC Primary, St Columba Anglican ECCE, Barataria Anglican Primary, St Dominic's Savio RC, St George's College, San Juan RC Primary, San Juan Presbyterian Primary, San Juan SDA Primary, and Febeau Government Primary.

To date the Ministers of Education have visited over 140 of the approximately 800 schools across the length and breadth of Trinidad – in all districts – from Icacos Government Primary and Cedros Secondary, to Matelot Community College and Guayaguayare RC; from ASJA Girls' and Boys' College to Siparia Hindu Primary. Therefore, the regrettable claims made in the article are unjustified, unfortunate and insupportable.

It is hoped that in future, the author, given his stated profession, will seek to verify the readily available facts prior to making such unfounded and potentially divisive assertions, and worse – seeking to have them published in the media.

The Ministry of Education's programme of school visits are extremely valuable with regard to policy-making, monitoring of schools' operations and infrastructure, and opening channels of communication with school administrators, and will continue to benefit the operations of the ministry positively.

Corporate Communications

Ministry of Education