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 And while we had the opportunity we asked Patrick Faber about the consolidation of certain subject areas of study among three Belize City High Schools: Sadie Vernon, Maude Williams and Excelsior. As we've reported, all these 3 schools will pool their resources to streamline resources and maximize subject offerings. 

As a part of the streamlining, 12 teachers from the different schools were declared redundant. 

Today, when we asked about it, he said that it was a tough decision which had to be made:

Hon. Patrick Faber – Ministry of Education
"You will recall that we had a press conference on this, and that we made it quite clear that no teacher would be let go based on lack of qualification or qualifications even though at the time, I did lament that indeed the majority of the teachers teaching at these three schools in fact were not professionally trained. But that was not the reason on which we based our decisions. In fact what we did, we looked at the curriculum that is being offered and you saw that in great detail at the press conference and we tried to fit as best as we could the teachers of the sixty-one of them into the delivery of that curriculum. That as you now know caused the issue of us having to displace, as you put it, twelve teachers. But as we said these schools were in fact overstaffed from the beginning. I remind people. Sometimes, we want the system to be fixed, and we're shedding tears now and crying for - and I don't want to be unkind to the teachers because of course, they are probably very good at what they do in some respects, and every dedicated. But, if you are not trained, and if fact, if you're in this position where you're assisting the process of developing education and making it better, then we can't make omelettes if we don't break a few eggs. So, I want to remind people of that. When we talk about change, sometimes, change brings with it some unpleasantries.""

Daniel Ortiz
"You do accept that even though the best intentions are what is being invoked here, there will be those teachers who believe the ministry unfairly removed them, right?"

Patrick Faber
"Well yes, I am certain that that will be the case. But correction, it is not the ministry. The Ministry is the proprietor of these schools. The managing authority of these schools is their respective boards and they are the ones who make these decisions. But you're right, for what it is, people will blame the minister. They will blame the ministry, and I take that on. I as I've said, I have no other agenda other than improving the quality of education, and those people who knock on our doors and ask us to do that,  must understand that that comes with some unpleasantry at times, and we'll just have to live with it."