Statement by Diallo Rabain, Minister of Education:
Part 3 – Does the Minister Hand Pick the Education Authority Board?
One of the questions being asked about the Education Authority is whether the Minister will be able to hand-pick its Board.
It is a fair question.
The legislation says that members are appointed by the Minister. But focusing only on the word “appointed” misses an important part of how the system is designed to work.
There is a difference between making the formal appointment and controlling who gets through the selection process.
The Minister does not simply pick nine people
The legislation establishes a process for selecting the initial members of the Education Authority Board. A process that is to be developed by the Board of Education.
The criteria for those appointments must cover qualifications, competencies, scoring, applications, interviews and vetting. Those criteria must be published, and the vacancies must be advertised. Initial appointees must satisfy the established criteria.
There is another important safeguard.
The Minister may propose changes to the selection criteria, but the Board of Education is not required to accept those proposals.
So, while the Minister ultimately makes the appointments, the legislation does not create a process where the Minister simply selects whoever he or she wants.
That distinction matters.
Expertise is built into the Board
The legislation also specifies the type of expertise that must be represented.
That includes expertise in modern educational practice and systems transformation, supporting vulnerable and at-risk students, as well as experience drawn from the private, public and voluntary sectors in areas such as accounting, human resources and entrepreneurship. Bermuda College is also represented.
In other words, we are not simply looking for people to occupy nine seats.
We are building a Board around the skills needed to govern a modern public education system.
Politics is deliberately kept off the Board
There is perhaps an even clearer answer to concerns about political influence.
Members of the House of Assembly and Senate are specifically disqualified from serving on the Education Authority Board.
That is deliberate.
If the objective were to establish another political body, there would be little reason to exclude politicians from serving on it.
The objective is the opposite: to establish professional governance around public education.
What about the first Chairman and CEO?
There is one important distinction during the establishment of the Authority.
The legislation provides transitional arrangements for the appointment of the first Chairman and first Chief Executive Officer.
That is part of getting a completely new organisation established.
It should not, however, be confused with how the institution is intended to operate on an ongoing basis.
For example, the legislation establishes a structured process for selecting the Chief Executive Officer, involving advertised criteria, applications, interviews and recommendations through a Search and Selection Committee.
The real safeguard
No appointment system can guarantee that everyone will agree with every person selected.
That is not the test.
The real question is whether the process is designed to prevent appointments from simply becoming an exercise in political preference.
That is why the legislation provides for published criteria, advertised vacancies, defined expertise, assessment and vetting, while expressly excluding legislators from membership of the Board.
The Minister performs the formal appointment.
But the people appointed must emerge through the process established around that appointment.
That is an important distinction between ministerial appointment and ministerial control.
And if we are serious about taking the day-to-day governance of public education further away from politics, that distinction is exactly what we should want.
