Page 311 - Bahrain Gov Annual Reports (IV)_Neat

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Number of dhows or launches arriving Manamah and Muharraq : 1.230
Number of aircraft lauding at Muharraq: 5.855
Number of aircraft, ships or other vessels quarantined: Nil
Number of Deratization Exemption Certificates Issued: 52
Number of Vaccinations and Inoculations carried out against:—
Smallpox ”.952
Cholera 2.215
Plague 1.375
Typhus .............................................................. 867
T. A. B.......................................................................................... 698
Yellow Fever .. 453

EDUCATION

Boys’ Schools.
(From the report of Mr. Ahmed A1 Umran, Director of Education.)
Schools.—At the beginning of the school year, in October 1951, there were 3,954 boys attend­
ing infants’, village, primary and secondary schools. This was an increase of 748 boys over the number
at the end of the previous term. It became possible to admit this large number of new boys by
enlarging some of the village schools and by moving the Secondary School into the new building,
adjacent to the school hostel; the old Secondary School building provided accommodation for a new
infants' school, on the ground floor, for 356 children, the first floor being taken over by the East
Primary School. Additions to the Sitra and Suq Al-Khamis Schools made it possible to take in another
160 boys. New schools were opened at Aali and Samahij, taking 52 and 90 boys respectively. As
these schools were of an experimental nature they were opened in hired houses, later, if they are
successful, the Government will build schools in these two villages. Other villages have petitioned to
have schools but it has been found that in the country parents arc more anxious to send very young
children to school, than older boys, who arc capable of working. The parents bring children for
admission to school who arc not more than five years old, regarding schools not primarily as places in
which to acquire education but safe depositories for small children.

Staff.—The staff of the department, both forgigners and Bahrainis worked harmoniously
during the year. The expansion of the schools and the increased number of classes made necessary
the recruitment of more foreign teachers ; 24 new teachers, some of them being replacements including
Lebanese, Syrian and Palestinian, were enlisted in Beirut by the Director of Education. The British
Council authorities, as in the past, gave valuable assistance. Nine Egyptians, some of them having
long service in Bahrain, filled posts in the Secondary School and the Teachers’ Training Class. At
the beginning of the school year there were 176 teachers of whom 52 were foreigners. Yusuf Shirawi,
a Bahrain Arab, who obtained a degree from the American University in Beirut in 1950, was appointed
teacher of Science and Mathematics in the Secondary School.

The standard of English in the schools is low and this restricts the possibility of advanced
education in Great Britain. The question of English being taught by an Englishman has for some
time been under consideration. Towards the end of the year the Bahrain Petroleum Company offered
to help the Government in this matter by providing the services of one or two British teachers of
English who would be employed by the Company to give lessons at the school. Such an arrangement
would be most valuable and would relieve the department from having to employ a European teacher,
which would inevitably have led to invidious comparison between conditions of service of European
and non-European teachers.