THE JAMAICA Teachers Association has come out strongly against the view expressed by the Ministry of Education, that schools will not be seriously disturbed this September by the migration of teachers to "greener pastures".

Secretary General of the JTA, Dr. Adolph Cameron, told The Gleaner that contrary to the position that the Education Ministry had adopted following the continued fallout of teachers, the gaps that had been created in the school system would have a negative impact on the upcoming school-year and in later years.

Migration, he said, would continue to be a force to reckon with as long as teachers felt uncomfortable with salaries and the working conditions prevailing in schools.

The Ministry had expressed such a view on the effects that migration was having, as a result of a different method of defining what was happening, Dr. Cameron said. He warned that it was not feasible to look only at the ability to replace the migrants "body for body" but that consideration must be given to the fact that a great deal of experience and training was being lost rapidly that, could not be replaced overnight.

Dr. Cameron said he knew of teachers who were benefitting from migrating and that, as long as teachers believed that they could be better rewarded, they would continue to abandon the system to go abroad, even, if it meant facing the challenges of a more hostile culture in behavioural patterns in schools abroad.

It was no longer necessary for recruiters to come to the island as everyone was now aware of the process involved, particularly as far as going to England was concerned, he said, and that a refusal on the part of some in the Education Ministry to make the link between the obvious interest in escaping the local system and the conditions in the schools locally was a big mistake.