(Imaginary) Apology from the Bishops' High School to the students and former students who are breaking silences..
Dear students and former students
Once again, you have had to highlight the failure of some of our teachers to show respect to you while we teach you and deal with the challenges which some of you bring.
We realise that we as a teacher body, have not been held accountable to you the students because in Guyana's history, of slavery and indentureship, that Massa's ways and behaviour was replicated in governance and in education. (If you don't know who Massa is then we need to do a lot more work)
And that for many of us teachers, that is the only way we know how to behave to students who we feel challenge our power.
We apologise to you the students for the harm and hurt caused to you by our actions. We know that these actions are caused by a few, named in your posts on the social media.
We know that those of us who are silent, who stand by because we are also afraid and who try to make up to you by being nice and kind for the abusive behaviour of our colleagues.
We apologise, even as we know, our nation seeks reparations for the violence which is our history and so we offer apologies as reparations to you the students . And to work on ways to ensure that we break from this history of violence and abuse.
We understand that healing and justice have to come with respect. We know that some former students have engaged in work to transform our societies and our education system, while some have wanted to preserve the plantation because it suits them well and that is the only way to survive or to seek revenge on those who wronged them.
And it is in this complexity, that we have to find a way to heal, to recover and to ensure, that as we keep an environment of learning, that we never again, will have any need to have any teacher named or hushed up or not talked about as Voldemort.
So we will fix this. We will seek healing for ourselves. We will acknowledge the hurt and pain caused to us and look at how we have transferred this hurt and pain to others.We as teachers have to unlearn, to seek and process feedback apart from grades.
We will invite the former students of the school, who have the knowledge and the skills, to work with the teachers and the students so that there is an environment of mutual respect and care. And we will remember that we have elevate each other and not put down, that even in rough times, that in times of disagreement, that we have to elevate.
Some of us have to learn new behaviours. It will be difficult. In Guyana, the truly powerful never apologise or transform based on the breaking of the silences on abuse and violence.
But if we do believe Bishops' High School is a place of excellence, then we have to do that Labor to Vincit Omnia the problems we have caused.
We know that teachers in our school have abused their power and trust. We know who those teachers are and we know that they have to be fixed and healed, no matter how much passes the students get.
Yours sincerely
The teachers who have been named in social media posts, and whose names have been shouted and called in whispers throughout the years
and those teachers who have been named as good teachers but who have been silent because they do not want to create story because story is the last thing you want with colleagues who are bullies
and the HM and the School Board and the Ministry of Education and the
Parent Teachers Association and the Old Students' Association
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