Junior College’s Four-Year Courses A Sign Of Widening Social Gap, Julie Zahra Warns
After Junior College announced it is giving students the option to complete their studies over four years, Nationalist MP Julie Zahra described the move as a sign of the growing gap between the haves and have-nots.
“16-year-old youths are being forced to work… beyond all the pomp and ceremony to show off Malta’s economic progress, the gap between classes is truly increasing,” Zahra said.
“This is what it means when we say economic wealth isn’t being distributed properly. The big keep getting bigger and the small keep getting smaller.”
Junior College’s decision to give students the option to complete their post-secondary studies over four years, rather than the traditional two, stems from a rise in teenage workers.
“We have a number of students who have no option but to work from a young age with some of them being their family’s breadwinners,” Junior College vice-principal Roderick Vassallo told Times of Malta.
“By spreading the course over four years, they are able to do that while also working towards getting their A levels. Without this option, they would probably drop out of school at 16 and we do not want that.”
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