Dr. Patricia Turnbull is an author, poet and adjunct lecturer at the H. Lavity Stoutt Community College, where she taught full time before her retirement in 2005. Recently, Dr. Turnbull helped put together the poetry anthology Where I see the Sun – Contemporary Poetry in the Virgin Islands. Her work has appeared in various publications, and she has written two books of her own.
People call me Teacher Pat or Dr. Pat. I’ve been living in these Virgin Islands for over 40 years. I was born [in 1952] and raised in St. Lucia.
I moved to Barbados around 19, where I started university in the University of the West Indies. Prior to that, my intention was to do journalism. I always wanted to be a broadcast journalist. I loved radio. I still do. But when I got to Barbados, like most young people without guidance you get distracted. I loved literature, and for some reason the journalism didn’t hold up. But that’s what took me to Barbados. I did general studies, majoring in literature and history and social sciences.
Teaching
I never thought of being a teacher, but I got married immediately after graduation to my university sweetheart, who is from here. I had just turned 22. I moved here and we started a family right after.
My first job actually was at an insurance firm that no longer exists. It wasn’t too long after that my husband went on to do engineering at the University of the West Indies. I decided I was not going to stay here alone, so I returned to St. Lucia. When I returned, a job was waiting for me. I think I got a job in the middle of the semester. Just as I came, I was placed and that was my introduction to education. I got a job teaching at a new comprehensive school. I wasn’t much older than many of my students. I remember us having a good time.
In the VI
After St. Lucia, I moved a year later to Trinidad to join my husband. We stayed there for about three years, and we returned here and at that time I was pregnant with my daughter. After I had her, I taught at St. George’s School. St. George’s was experimenting as early as then. That was in 1978. They wanted to start their secondary education programme. It had been a primary/elementary school for a long time. There were about a dozen students who would at that time usually transition overseas. St. George’s was a different demography at the time, and most of the students, when they reached secondary school, very few would transition to the BVI High School: They would go on to boarding school overseas.
At that time, some parents wanted for their children to remain home, so they needed somebody to teach the secondary curriculum. I got that job, and that was my first teaching job on these islands.
It was very difficult because it wasn’t like I had done before, teaching one or two courses like English or history: I had to teach them everything. It was very demanding. There was an opening at the high school for the coming school year, and I transitioned to the BVI High School. I liked it. Not that today’s staff is not as committed, but I think today’s teachers have a different set of demands facing them, a lot of the social issues they have to reckon with in the classroom. Compared to now, the community of staff was very tight. I remember us having parties, field trips and things like that. I found it very challenging, and I stayed at the high school for 11 years.
HLSCC
By 1990 when the college started, I thought I could do more than classroom teaching with our college — do education beyond the walls of the classrooms, try to get more in touch with those people who didn’t have those opportunities, those who kept telling me they have this or that they’d like to write. I wanted to do more adult education. The honourable Lavity Stoutt, I remember him calling upon me and challenging me and others to write about the culture and history of these islands. He always reminded me, “Mistress Turnbull, we have to get people to write about our history, about our culture and how we live.” At that time I was not Dr. Turnbull. I remember the day we assembled, I heeded that call because I had been doing it quietly.
State of education
This might sound unusual, but I think we need to give much more credit to educators, teachers as professionals. Increasingly, I feel like teachers are being dictated to, even told how to do their job and lectured at some times. I don’t think we are quite aware as to the type of training and studies that teachers do to make them the professionals that they are. Teachers need to be more accretive compared to other professionals like doctors and lawyers. I think an effort is being made to do so institutionally. I’ve seen and heard of new initiatives that would restore that kind of control to educators. They’re really challenged with everything that goes on in our community.
Interview conducted, condensed and edited by Ngovou Gyang.
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