Forty Years Later Nothing Has Changed In Bonnett:

Bonnet Primary School is nes­tled in the cool hilly regions of North east Saint Catherine. Bonnett District was for­mer­ly a cul-de-sac, you get in on foot or vehic­u­lar ‚then turn around and head back toward Benbow.

As a kid grow­ing up there, life was sim­ple in the 60’s and 70’s most of us were poor, we ran around bare-feet, patch­es of dif­fer­ent cloth in the back­side of our shorts which had seen bet­ter days. We drank from the streams, we swam in the rivers, played soc­cer and crick­et in the school-yard bare-feet.

The Primary school then was one big open room sep­a­rat­ed by calk-boards , at times hous­ing as much as nine class­es, look­ing back it seem strange that any­one could learn any­thing in the din of hun­dreds of stu­dents recit­ing , read­ing and just talk­ing at the same time.

Most times it was like a bee-hive, bro­ken only when teach­ers took us out­side on the grass under the trees. As lit­tle kids we loved being out of the school-room and out in the open. I for one was way more com­fort­able sit­ting on the grass in my khakis, say­ing “me teacher“in that sing song voice we asso­ciate with grade school kids.

As a sec­ondary school stu­dent I lob­bied the mem­ber of Parliament, I called in to Ronnie Thwaites, I wrote let­ters beg­ging that the roads lead­ing in to the dis­trict be paved. It was­n’t until after I had grad­u­at­ed high school, that they final­ly got around to paving the Bonnet to Benbow Road.

Unfortunately the way things stood in the 70’s are the way they remain today.

Gleaner pho­to:

This is the uri­nal I used as a kid , it was noth­ing more than a runoff into a hole, it is the same as it was in the 70’s today. http://​jamaica​-glean​er​.com/​g​l​e​a​n​e​r​/​2​0​1​3​0​6​1​5​/​n​e​w​s​/​n​e​w​s​1​.​h​tml

Gleaner pho­to:

The math teacher Althea Bryan (my cousin )is my Aunt’s daugh­ter, she decid­ed to stay and edu­cate the kids, as her mom did for years before she retired.

The teach­ers com­plain there is no piped water, as it was 30- 40 years ago, so is it today. No staff room for teach­ers, no com­put­ers, they say plans have been sub­mit­ted to the Ministry of Education for upgrades to the school, argu­ing that res­i­dents are will­ing to do the work them­selves, yet no mon­ey or mate­r­i­al has been forth­com­ing from the government.

I have already called and pledged the first desk­top com­put­er to the school, any­one will­ing to join me in this wor­thy cause may con­tact me at excellence@​hvc.​rr.​com. Your help would be great­ly appreciated.

When we talk about how gov­ern­ment and par­ty pol­i­tics have failed the peo­ple some are indig­nant. These peo­ple are us, me and you, I grew up here these kids are me and I am they.