Teacher Marisoli Flores instructing students during a lesson.
CAY HILL--Some of the money from the Trust Fund flowing through the Emergency Income Support and Training Programme (EISTP) is being used for a literacy programme at Sint Maarten Training Foundation (SMTF).
“Literacy is a subject that does not receive much attention on the island. Through our work with unemployed and underemployed persons at SMTF we experienced first-hand that literacy is a major challenge affecting a significant portion of the local workforce. We don’t have official statistics, but our data suggest that the problem is much bigger than most realize and that women are disproportionally affected,” Head of Communication, Human Resources and Counselling at SMTF Steve Duzanson said in a press statement on Tuesday.
Being functionally illiterate is detrimental to a person’s self-esteem and limits his or her job opportunities. To assist those students, SMTF partnered with University of St Martin (USM) to provide course material and a specialised teacher to work with the adult students. The first group of 15 students came from the English-As-Second-Language programme that SMTF offers in collaboration with USM. These students were selected because they had difficulty completing the course as a direct result of the literacy barrier.”
“You must realize that some of these students never had the opportunity to go to school, while others had negative associations with school or have learning difficulties which have gone undiagnosed and caused them to struggle with the basics of sounding out words,” explained literacy teacher Marisoli Flores.
“However, all were illiterate in their own language and basic motor skills needed for writing were not developed,” Flores said.
The literacy programme consists of six basic components: phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, comprehension and writing. Phonemic awareness is the ability to recognize and use different sounds while speaking. Phonics on the other hand, is focused on how to write what is being heard.
“The literacy pilot programme at SMTF has been running for four months and the results are impressive.” In the beginning, students learned to trace the letters of the alphabet and to construct words. “Now that they have become familiar with letters and numbers, they can recognise numeric dates, as well as the days of the week. The students are also able to copy, write and read short phrases and complete sentences. Their command of the English language has improved dramatically. They can now communicate basic information, emotions and opinions on familiar topics. In the coming months the students will focus on reading and understanding commonly used texts in daily life situations such as during grocery shopping in the supermarket, purchasing goods in a store or following instructions on the job,” it was stated in the release.
“We are happy to be able to use the disbursements from the Trust Fund to provide basic literacy skills to this group of students. We know that there are many more unemployed people in our community who can benefit from this literacy programme. We hope to reach them and make that difference in their lives. It is all part of the larger plan to rebuild Sint Maarten better and stronger, and that starts with our human capital,” commented SMTF Programme Director Sergio Wolff.
SMTF runs the EISTP which is financed by the government of the Netherlands, managed by the World Bank and implemented by the National Recovery Programme Bureau (NRPB). The programme is made possible by the devolution of monies from the Trust Fund and caters to persons who are unemployed or underemployed
(working part-time, less than 20 hours per week). All enrolled students receive financial support (stipend) for attending classes and successfully completing the programme, as well as medical coverage through SZV in addition to a small transportation allowance.
The un-(under)employed enrol in courses about Hospitality, Culinary, Construction, Sint Maarten Culture and History (which is an integral part of hospitality and culinary), English as Second Language and Basic Literacy. SMTF partners with different entities such as USM and NIPA on some of the courses. The goal of the programme is to provide (temporary) income support to the unemployed and underemployed, while equipping them with the tools necessary to achieve full gainful employment.
Persons wishing to participate in the programme must register at the Labour Department. Criteria such as legal status in St. Maarten, level of (un)employment and residency are used to determine eligibility. Once eligibility has been established by the Labour Department, the applicant is transferred to SMTF to complete the enrolment process.
Interested persons can contact the Labour Department or call SMTF at tel. 5207574 for more information. SMTF is located at the Hillside Christian Schools’
Asha Stevens Campus in Cay Hill.
