SXMElections.com

Dear Editor,

Please allow me some space in your newspaper to address the Government and Parliament of St. Maarten and Ronald Plasterk, Minister of the Interior and Kingdom Relations.

St. Maarten Government, Parliament and Minister Plasterk, my name is Reinder Torrenga and I'm a proud father of a daughter with Down syndrome. This is not the first time I need to use the media to speak about my frustration and make a plea to our Council of Ministers and the parliament of our country St. Maarten, concerning the need of special education for the children.

In the year 2012, the United Nations conducted an analysis concerning the rights of the child in St. Maarten, and the report was finalized in March 2013. One of the recommendations of that analysis concerning St. Maarten is that children with special needs must be included in the public education. With this conclusion of the UN concerning special education in our country, I was looking forward to a positive change for the children in need of special education.

At this time, the children are left out of the right to education, because St. Maarten simply does not have special education in place for children with Down syndrome! The only special education school in St. Maarten did not accept our daughter, because of her disability! During the launching ceremony of the 24th Anniversary of the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child held on the 20th of November 2013, our former Prime Minister Sarah Wescot-Williams said that since St. Maarten became a country, they became a separate party to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, thus making St. Maarten accountable to the international community.

They need to show when and how the country made progress as far as upholding the Rights of the Child as is stated in the Convention. Our former Minister of Education, Culture, Youth & Sports Patricia Lourens-Philip recently received the Plan of Action regarding Children Rights from the "Kingdom Taskforce" which was established during the Kingdom Conference held on April 2nd 2014 in Aruba. The document termed "Plan van aanpak Kinderrechten "Eerste Aanzet" 20 November 2014, outlines proposed priority areas for cooperation between the Countries of the Kingdom, and were selected from the recommendations of UNICEF's reports presented last year to all the Governments of the Kingdom. The following priority areas were selected from the recommendations in the UNICEF report.

* The family as central point

* Child abuse

* Safety Net/afterschool care of children

* The role of the parents in the raising of the child

* Stipulations/Criteria/Parameters and Infrastructure

To my disappointment, the recommendation to include the children in need of special education was not selected as a priority. Although I applaud the five points selected, I still believe the need for special education should be included. As parents of a child with Down syndrome, we went through a lot of obstacles to find a school, which had a good setting that suits her capability to receive education.

Our daughter is attending Charles Leopold Bell School where there is a small class setting, which is the perfect setting for a child with Down syndrome to receive extra guidance from the teachers. As parents, we are very grateful to Principal Samuel and her dedicated staff, for giving our daughter a chance to receive the education which she is entitled to.

In 2012, we were active in corresponding with the Government and Parliament of our country concerning the need of special education in St. Maarten, but there was little to no response at all. For me as a father, it is very frustrating that improvement of special education is still not on the agenda, which makes me wonder if there is a neglect or no-care attitude towards children in need of special education?

There was even a member of parliament, who made a statement in the past that if you have a child in need of special education, it is better to leave the country. Imagine the impact that statement makes on the children and parents of a child in need of special education. There will always be children in need of special education, in the past, today and also in the future!

The report with the recommendations from the Kingdom Taskforce will be presented in the Council of Ministers and Parliament of St. Maarten. I sincerely HOPE that the new Government and newly-elected Parliament of St. Maarten will finally put the improvement of special education on the agenda, and bring it forward to the next Kingdom Conference scheduled for April 2015.

Reinder Torrenga