Cindy Clelie and Alain Ah Vee, each sent a letter to the Education Minister, following the Assises on Education organized by the Ministry

21.04.2025

LALIT is publishing letters that our two delegates, Cindy Clelie and Alain Ah Vee, each sent to the Education Minister, following the Assises on Education organized by the Ministry. The Assises were a fine initiative, bringing together all those involved in education to find “solutions” to the problems in the education system. It was well attended by teachers, all keen to contribute to the groups they were in. Each group on the three days came up with five proposals. However, our delegates found that the issue that they had brought up, in the name of LALIT, and which had got support in the group, though due to be in the Report Back to the plenary sessions, was not mentioned. Each wrote a letter to the Minister.

Letter Written by Cindy Clelie,

To Minister of Education,

Honourable Mahend Gungapersand,

18th April 2025

Dear Sir and members of the organizing committee of "Assises de L'Education",

Re: Omission in Report-Back of Proposals from Sessions At the “Assises”

My name is Cindy Clelie, and I was delegated by Lalit to be present for the Assises, which we welcome.

I was present to put forward the urgent proposal to open debate on introducing our mother tongue, Kreol Repiblik Moris, as the medium of instruction at all levels of education sectors. As you will know from our submission in writing we propose, at least for a few years, “Dual Medium, Kreol and English” for “content subjects” like science and mathematics i.e. for classes, books, texts, exercises and any evaluation or examination, leaving the choice of language to students for their written work, including examinations. This is, as you know, in harmony with decades long UNESCO “best practices”, and produces excellent results in small countries with little known mother tongues as medium. We refer to countries like Finland and Norway, that top the education evaluation by all reckoning.

I attended, in Lalit’s name, on Wednesday 16th April’s session on “Behavior Management”. After a long and consensual collective reflection, our group agreed on our 5 proposals. One was the “introduction of the mother tongue as medium of instruction” as a priority in seeking solutions for many behavioral problems. Somehow, this specific demand was not reported in the plenary report presented by Mr Ramsurrun, who was delegated by our workshop. This unfortunate accidental omission is important. It is a democratic principle thatthe person giving the report like this includes all major points. Furthermore, before leaving the workshop classroom I spoke to the officer-in charge presiding over the atelier, and she gave her word to me that “mother tongue as medium of instruction” is, in fact, on the list of agreed proposals, and will be submitted as such.

I write this letter to ensure that this is the case.

The suppression of the mother tongue in schools, by not using it as the medium of instruction for “content subjects” is an act, itself, of violence, institutional violence, against our children. In turn, this violence produces a reaction amongst many of our students, and this reaction includes behavioral disorders, including violence.

It is because we in Lalit are convinced that suppression of the mother tongue is harmful to children in many ways that I write to ensure that one of the key solutions to the problem of violent behavior does not get erased, whether by accidental omission or by a well meaning officer judging it to be unimportant.

We believe that the resources, commitment and philosophy put forward by members of the organizing committee in the plenary sessions are clearly genuinely orientated towards positive change. We agree with the emphasis that you, as Minister, have put on seeking “solutions” to problems.

We reaffirm our demand that Kreol be introduced as medium of instruction in all schools, alongside English.

It is urgent for the simple reason that suppressing the mother tongue is harmful to children. We call on all of you to take cognizance of the “Findings” of the International Hearing into the Harm Done to Children by the Suppression of the Mother Tongue in Schools held in Mauritius in 2009 and which we submitted to you.

We should, therefore, urgently address stopping doing this harm. It is a heavy negative colonial legacy that acts on a brake on children’s freedom to learn. Quite simply, the suppression of the mother tongue prevents us from thinking properly, and can make children act irrationally, even violently.

Sincerely,

Cindy Clelie,

For LALIT

Letter Written by Alain Ah Vee

To The Minister of Education as co-ordinator of the Assises de l’Education,

Dear Sir,

I wish to make a formal complaint concerning the report made by the Rapporteur of the “Curriculum and Technology” group which met during the Breakaway Session yesterday at the MGI.

I was present in this group as one of the two members of LALIT delegated to attend in LALIT’s name.

I was thus one of the 30-35 participants in this group, which was chaired in a constructive and cordial manner by Mr. Purmessur (if my memory serves me right). It was very lively. During the one-hour session I had two short inputs on the question of the necessity of using the Mauritian mother tongue to teach content subjects such as Science, Mathematics, Technology. I explained that if we want our children to love to learn any subject, it should be taught in a language that they understand well, that they understand with precision, and that they feel at ease and free with. In short, it should be in the natural language of the children. The mother tongue is, of course, our natural “means of representing in our minds the world around us, and within us.” So I proposed the introduction of a bilingual Kreol-English medium, which the Prevok-BEC adopted successfully some years ago.

Ledikasyon Pu Travayer, UNESCO International Literacy Prize Winner 2004, has also some 45 years rich experience in adult literacy teaching in Kreol, which has proven this. Furthermore after 13 years of the Ministry’s teaching Kreol as a subject in schools, we have now, as a society, created the basic materials necessary to embark on this bold and long-awaited educational reform. This would also be in line with UNESCO’s long and constant stand in favour of the use of the mother tongue as medium, as was clearly put forward by its Regional Director in her speech on the opening of the Assises.

Then in my other short input I explained the advantages of attaining high level proficiency in many languages, which in LALIT we think is one of the aims of education. This is true as we live in a more and more interconnected world. I placed emphasis specifically on the advantage of developing the capacity in children for divergent thinking and for the ability to find innovative solutions to the big challenges we, as a world, are facing today and will face tomorrow. And the key factor to arrive at this high level multilingualism is the use of the mother tongue as “scaffolding”, to use the expression linguists use for this process. The mother tongue is our natural means of high-level thinking, of developing high-level cognition, and integrating all the knowledge into our own minds in a way that we can easily process it.

This proposal in favour of using Kreol, or Kreol and English, as medium was also expressed by other participants in the group.

I remember specifically one teacher from Rodrigues, one psychologist and also a primary school teacher from Mauritius, amongst others. But this proposal was completely left out by the Rapporteur, a lecturer from the MIE. It should be mentioned that in fact it was a woman participant who was supposed to act as Rapporteur for the group. This may explain the reporting error.

Please could you include this proposal as one of the possible “solutions” to the problems presented for the difficulties in curriculum and keeping up with new technology. In fact, worldwide studies have shown that the mother tongue is the finest tool for use in schools. The longitudinal studies in the USA by David Ramirez, had already shown that the longer children learn through their mother tongue the better they do at science, maths and also at 2nd and 3rd languages. Similar studies by ADEA in some 25 African countries have all given similar results.

Kind regards,

Alain Ah Vee

for LALIT