By: La'Toya Webster
Writer-SKNVibes.com
(Basseterre, St. Kitts) The long summer vacation is over and it's back to school once again as the new school year is days away. Already, Parents are spending tons of money purchasing their child/ward back to school necessities which is usually a major expense.
The Students Education Learning Funds (SELF) program is designed to take some of the financial burden off of parents who are preparing their children for school.
The program was started under the People's Action Movement Government in 1989 and has been continued by the Labour Government in 1995 and is present today.
The program is an initiative executed by the Ministry of Education, who provides thousands of text books to the Primary and Secondary schools in St. Kitts and Nevis.
The students will then go to the schools and choose their appropriate text books stated on their book list. The high school students are allowed to take home the text books while the primary school students will use the text books during school only.
Carlene Corlette, assistant coordinator within the Ministry of Education said that the program is a good initiative and will benefit the students well.
"When I was going to school my mother had to buy my text books, the children today are very privilege, they receive a lot of free things and that should not be a reason for them not to attend school," she said.
She also said that the SELF program, is nothing to be ashamed of and that she knows that parents aren't ashamed of being involved with SELF.
SKNVibes spoke to a parent who said that the program has helped her to provide more efficiently for her children's school needs.
"As a parent of six children I am very grateful to the SELF program because without it I would not have been able to buy all those text books and still the other school equipment," she said.
"So the SELF program is a great help for me and my children, and when I say a great help for me I mean in terms of saving money for other things and my children would not have to be robbed out of learning."
She added that children should take good care of the SELF books even though their parents did not purchase them.
~~Adz:Right~~The students who take home the books are asked to cover and keep them well kept because the books will be passed on to other students at the end of the school term.
Anella Liddie a 12-year-old student of the Sandy Point High School said that as a student she is not ashamed of being apart of the SELF program.
"I'm not ashamed of using SELF," Liddie said. "It is benefiting me and my siblings and it helps keep money in my mother's pocket for bills and any other monetary issues that may occur."
She continued "I also think it is a very good thing what the government is doing, for we know that many cannot afford to buy like four text books never mind two."