Beverley McLaren: A life of service to Jamaica’s youth and Old Harbour

As an educator with some thirty-plus years in both the Jamaican and American classrooms, she has been able to, over the years, dispense not just good grades but equally as important, kindness and compassion.

For her tireless efforts in shaping the leaders of tomorrow, McLaren will, on National Heroes Day, be recognised with the Badge of Honour for long and faithful service. An honour she is delighted to receive as the now retired educator looks back with pride at her handiwork and acknowledges that though the classroom will always be challenging, if even one student can say she impacted their life positively, then it was certainly worth every marked assignment, every pep talk and every bit of reassurance.

“When I heard I was getting an award, I was honestly so shocked and excited. I just praised God, and then I became so humble and thankful. It was just a whole lot of different emotions,” McLaren told Old Harbour News. This most recent accolade is yet another feather in an illustrious and highly decorated career of McLaren who was among the recipients awarded the Prime Minister's Medal of Appreciation for Service to Education in 2023. 

After 34 years, McLaren retired as a senior teacher at Pembroke Hall High School, which is also her alma mater, McLaren says the best thing about being an educator: “You're a caregiver. You're a sister, brother. Mother. Father. Nurse. You name it, and once you build a relationship with your students, they will come to you for advice. There's a guidance counsellor, but they choose you as a person to relate to and to confide in.”

“I also get to meet a wide range of students from different socio-economic backgrounds,” continued the Claremont Heights, Old Harbour resident. “You impart knowledge and when they grasp it, the gratitude they show at the end is rewarding. You see a student who other teachers have given up on, or didn't even recommend them for the exam, and you say, ‘John, come sit right beside me, and as long as you're willing to learn, you will succeed, and whatever you want to be, you can achieve’, and I see it come to pass.” 

Despite the opportunities for individual growth and transformation, being in the classroom today is not for the weak of heart, and McLaren acknowledges that indiscipline is an even bigger challenge than illiteracy. 

“While it may be different in some rural areas because of a lack of access to resources or severe overcrowding, indiscipline is a critical issue. The entire society is indiscipline, and it spins off on the children. Parents are rude to teachers and so students have little or no respect for them. When I returned to the classroom, having spent the two years abroad, it's like walking into a different world. Students no longer call us by our names. It's ‘the woman over there’ or ‘the woman who teaches science.’”

However, having immersed herself in her students’ lives, her authoritative approach works to counter students’ bad behaviour. In explaining her approach she said: “When there's a fight, as short as I am, I run into the fight, and I would grab the aggressor, and then the boys would say, ‘If you ever throw a blow and mek it catch my teacher today esee’. That's how much my students love and care about me. When they are rude to other teachers, I would always say, ‘would you be rude to me?’ And they said, “No Miss”. And I said, “Why not? ‘Miss, you different’.

“There's a line of demarcation between teacher and students, and I demand that respect. So you walk into my room to learn. You come under my tutelage. If anybody else don't demand it, I demand respect. So every time they walk in my classroom, I make sure my name is on the board. They know when they come to my class, they have to form a queue, and when they come in, they stand. It's my room, and I'm in charge.”

Some of McLaren’s students have gone on to become entrepreneurs, lawyers and doctors. Not bad for a high school science teacher who incidentally has taught far more than just the sciences. “I'm a trained teacher of integrated science, so I taught science from grade seven to eleven. When the curriculum changed, I became a teacher of cosmetology,” she said. “And then, when I got my degree, I kept learning new things and then the principal turned me into a home economics teacher. I remember I protested to the point I called the Ministry of Education. And they said, ‘Miss McLaren, if the principal has that amount of faith in you, go and do it’. And so, home economics was added. Then, because I'm a sports enthusiast, I would sit at the window watching what's going on at the field. They had good talent in netball, but we wouldn't win anything. When the netball teacher decided to migrate, I went to the principal and I said, ‘Can you hire a science teacher and put me in the P.E. department? Give me five years to see if I can turn this department around’. He said, ‘You're joking’. I said, ‘No, let me try’. And so I taught P.E.”

In 2009, she decided to broaden her horizons and went off to teach in North Carolina and immediately recognised the differences in both education systems, as our friend to the north has better management and technological resources. “Even in terms of how you administer discipline and interact with students, it is different,” McLaren said. “ In Jamaica culture, we embrace our students and hug them. In the US, at all times, you must be arm’s length away, and you can't be seen at any time alone in a classroom with a student. It’s considered sexual harassment. You can’t just say ‘you're going to stay back this evening because you have a detention’. So, it's totally different from our system here in Jamaica.”

After two years, she felt the pull of her homeland and realised that her expertise was more needed back in Jamaica. “I resigned because my students here needed me more than those abroad. So, despite the fact that I was earning maybe four times my salary, but it wasn’t about the money; it was about the dedication,” she said. 

Though a trained teacher of science, McLaren has never put any limit on herself to learn and adapt. “When the curriculum changed, we implemented the cosmetology department along with IT, but we didn't have any cosmetology teacher, so your humble servant enrolled herself in school,” she said. For six months, she taught in the mornings and then headed off in the afternoons to Lenora's School of Beauty. “And then whatever I learned, I came back, reconstructed and redesigned a room and converted it into the cosmetology lab. Then I went a little further and spent all of that summer raising funds to furnish that room. So I begged money from the Port Authority of Jamaica, Courts, Singer and NCB to buy dryers and sinks, etc so we could have a salon different from the classroom,” she said.

When her first batch of cosmetology students were uncertain about what they were doing because it is an NCT-Vet certified programme, she enrolled and registered herself as a student and did the exam with them to show them that they have nothing to fear. “When the assessors came and said, ‘What are you doing in the room, Miss McLaren?’ I said, ‘Look at your list, I’m a student today’, and so I was certified by HEART.”

What keeps her motivated is her love for people.  “I just love people, and it's not limited to students. Annually, my family assist with a back-to-school drive.  We set up a fund at a school where if the students are short of whatever resources, they can go and they sign for it. It's not a scholarship because it is not based on academic performance, just need,” she said. “So once per month, according to the list, they would go to the office and sign that they received the money and go and buy the practical things. So over the years I have sponsored a lot of students. When they also need somewhere safe to stay, I would take them home along with a friend, or I would ask my sister to come and stay.

“Once somebody is in need, I just have to respond. Whether it's a care package or to pay a bill. Once I hear the person's need, I can't sit by. If I know that somebody out there is hungry, I have to help so it's just a genuine love for people. Even when they’re feisty or rude, I tell myself that I’m not perfect, so I swallow, and when I calm down, I will still help. And to be honest, as long as God lends me breath, I will continue.”

When asked what other profession she may have considered, McLaren once dreamt of being a flight attendant. “My father used to say, ‘You want to turn an uptown waitress’ but I didn’t see it that way. But I was misguided because I didn’t do my own research, so persons told me that I would need to have Spanish, which I didn’t, and so I did my second love, which was teaching.”

McLaren, who has resided in Claremont Heights, Old Harbour for the past 30 years, is originally from Duhaney Park in St Andrew. “I come from a large family,” she tells me. There were at least 13 children in the family, and that is on one side. As the older children migrated, their children would come and stay with us, so there were always a lot of children in the household. My mother was a housewife, and my dad was an artisan, which is a boasy word for carpenter.”

Growing up in a large family, everyone, she said, had their role or their chore because her mother could not tolerate children just sitting around idle. As one of the eldest, she got kitchen duty, which is possibly one of the reasons, she stays away from the kitchen as much as possible these days. What she does love is gardening and tending to her plants, noting “Every little thing when it comes to the earth, that is me. Digging and planting and replanting. I can't take the kitchen because it's ungrateful.” 

Aside from this, McLaren does a lot of volunteer work within the church as she is an Adventist and has been a community service leader for the past seven years. “That is really my passion. I help to implement a whole lot of programmes for both church and community. We take all the seniors and give them a day out at the beach, all expenses paid. All they have to do is come and we feed them because we charter buses to get there etc. We also work a lot with different children's homes. There’s a lot of work to be done, and with joy, we'll carry on. I can't do it by myself, so with the help of my teammates, we carry on,” she said.