According to Minister of Education, Patrick Faber, part of the 2010 plan for education is to introduce a training bill and establish the Belize Teaching Services Commission.  The much debated TSC was already introduced to the house in late 2009 and is now in its committee stage.  On Monday February 1st, Ministry of Education’s CEO said that there would have been a meeting to elect a chairman and to consider the education and training bill 2009.    Yesterday, Thursday February 11th, there was a meeting of the House Committee on Education, Sports, and Training, to consider the Education and Training Bill 2009.  The groups present were ATLIB, the Roman Catholic Bishop’s Commission on Education, NOPCAN, BNTU, and Private Citizen, Dianne Lindo. According to information reaching us, the process for making representation was not structured for public access. Those who attended the meeting were gathered in the Committee room’s waiting area; and each group was called individually to make its representation.  Plus news understands that NOPCAN’s representation pertained to removing corporal punishment from the Bill; BNTU focused on retaining corporal punishment until an effective disciplinary and support system could replace it.  The Bishop’s Commission included church representation on the various councils and the Teaching Service Commission. This group lobbied for disallowing the Solicitor-General as Chair of the Teaching Service Appeals Tribunal, retaining authority of Managing Authorities to discipline teachers, and giving Managing Authorities the right to establish codes of conduct for their teachers.  Ms. Lindo’s presentation was that the powers of the Teaching Service Appeals Tribunal need to be clearly laid out in the Bill, and the Bill must be available for public reading before the final version goes to the house.  We tried contacting the MOE’s press officer for comments on the closed meeting; but our efforts were futile.