Education Minister Dr Tim Gopeesingh has said only “a few thousand” students actively play sports in schools across the country, adding that this figure was still too low.
He urged more students to get involved in various sporting programmes.
The minister also thanked teachers who he said had been given yeoman service to various sporting initiatives.
“Our teachers in the primary schools are now trained to some extent to help the students in physical education. We have had significant reforms in our primary school curriculum,” Gopeesingh said.
He was speaking at the handing-over ceremony of physical education and sporting equipment by the Government of the People’s Republic of China at the Russell Latapy Secondary School, Cipriani Street, Morvant, yesterday.
Saying sports was instrumental he said the Chinese Government had handed over a range of sporting gear, including badminton, football and volleyball equipment which would be distributed among the primary and secondary schools.
The minister said the equipment would be distributed to the schools depending on the numbers of students and the size of the schools.
“Some would also be donated to the Ministries of Community Development for and Tertiary Education,” Gopeesingh added.
He said it was the brainchild of Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar to have badminton and table tennis sets in school, given the fact that such equipment needed little space.
In the secondary schools, he said, physical education was an important part of the physical education component.
“Physical education was compulsory from Forms One to Three. In 2009 1,013 wrote the exam with an 88 per cent pass rate.
“Last year we have increase the amount of students doing physical education from 1,013 to 1,552 in Form Five with a 95 per cent pass rate,” Gopeesingh said.