The opening of the Virgin Islands School of Technical Studies on Oct. 21 was a significant milestone in the annals of the education system in particular and the Virgin Islands in general. It is important to place this educational milestone in historic perspective.
Probably one of the earliest indications of the capabilities of the people of African ancestry to master technical skills was the construction of the famous pyramids of Africa, which still seems to defy the imagination of modern man. Even during the dark night of enslavement the technical skills of our ancestors shone through, and the building of such structures as the Church of the Africans at Kingstown, Tortola is a prime example.
After re-emancipation in 1834, Virgin Islanders also emancipated their trades and vocations. They wisely built trash houses as the material was gathered from the environment. From the 1920s to the 1950s, men of the VI built wooden houses, brick ovens and boats. Some of the men who went to work in Santo Domingo brought back such skills as soldering. The famous apprenticeship system was well established, and through it young men obtained skills in such trades as carpentry, boat building and sailing, and young ladies were taught baking, sewing and other skills. Sometime around the 1940s and 1950s termites destroyed wooden houses with a vengeance. The skilled men of the VI rose to the challenge and replaced the wooden houses with wall houses by building in sections. Later on, when banks came to the VI in the latter half of the 20th Century, the skilled men had mastered the art of building wall houses in sections and some homeowners did not have to secure mortgages. This history should be documented to provide continuity and provide students with a sense of pride at the indigenous skills of their ancestors.
First high school
The opening of the VI Secondary School in 1943 featured on its curriculum such technical subjects as woodwork, gardening and home economics. For many years the late Stanley Nibbs of Sea Cows Bay remained the sole woodwork instructor. At the upper classes of the primary schools there were simple art and craft classes, and the schools competed for a shield in handicraft. The vocational and technical education was broadened with the opening of the BVI Comprehensive High School in 1968. While pursuing a master’s degree with the University of Manchester in 1976-1977, I was required to review the VI education system, including technical education.
Among other things, I noted the building boom in the VI and joined in a call for a vocational and technical school of some kind. To add insult to injury, however, many professionals looked down on technical skills. The opening of the Literacy and Skills Programme (LASP) in 1982, which was merged with the BVI High School and the vocational school at Baughers Bay, also added to vocational and technical skills. Similar attempts were made at the government school in The Valley, Virgin Gorda.
As president of the BVI Teachers Union, I worked with other union members to invite Hull University, where I earned a Ph.D. in curricular studies in 1991, to carry out a teachers training programme, which was financed by the VI government. As a result, some 42 teachers were awarded certificates and bachelor’s degrees in education. At the end of the programme, Hull University offered to assist with the college, which was in its planning stage. However, to the shock and disappointment of the teachers and other educators, the government refused. In 1990 the college was to be a technical institution, but this was abandoned for the arts programmes. These two major moves by the government of the day, against the advice of myself and others, have caused a severe setback to vocational and technical education in the VI for years. As I advised then, the arts programmes should have been added to the technical programmes.
One wonders if this was an attempt to lessen the influence of the BVI Teachers Union in establishing the college. Be that as it may, what a price to pay. The newly opened college struggled for years, and we may have lost a generation or more of Virgin Islanders who could have been exposed to more vocational and technical education. I shudder at these two mistakes but will shudder less with the opening of the new technical school. Talk show host Douglas Wheatley insists that those responsible for education at that time dropped the ball. One valuable lesson we should learn from all this is that we should always put the territory first.
‘Great things’
This grand occasion signifies that great things are expected of the new institution. The naming of one of the buildings in honour of the late Stanley Nibbs, who was a renowned teacher and woodwork instructor who served the VI for more than 50 years, is well deserving. The new school was long in becoming reality. As a former teacher, educator and curriculum expert, I extend best wishes to this new institution on behalf of myself and my family.
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