The acting secretary in the Primary and Secondary Education ministry, Rodgers Sisimayi, has said the mushrooming of unregistered schools and colleges is affecting the education system in the country.
BY VENERANDA LANGA
Sisimayi yesterday appeared before the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Education to give an overview on the implementation of the 2016 budget by his ministry.
“Resource constraints have made it difficult for the ministry to implement some of its programmes, as well as erratic release of funds to support programmes in the ministry,” he said.
“There is mushrooming of unregistered schools and colleges and non-compliance with registration requirements of colleges, although we have instruments to guide us in terms of registration.”
Despite experiencing funding challenges, Sisimayi said the ministry disbursed $2,3 million to 98 schools and $8,6 million in school improvement grants to 2 903 schools.
He said a curriculum framework for primary and secondary education for 2015 to 2022 had been produced, while 720 trainers for syllabus interpretation had been trained.
Sisimayi said there were 5 905 primary schools and 2 481 secondary schools with over 4,3 million learners in total.
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A total of 2 400 teachers were pursuing degree programmes with different universities in areas such as indigenous languages, heritage studies, science and mathematics, with 2 700 teachers being on capacity development.
Grade Seven results were said to have improved by 3% from the 55% pass rate in 2014 to 58% in 2015.
O Level results improved by 5,07%, while A Level results improved by 4,8%.
Ministry financial director, Betty Wenjere, said employment costs were the major contributor to the ministry’s expenditure.
On priorities in 2017, the ministry said it wanted to increase teacher training in infant education and strengthen the school feeding programme, as that would improve children’s participation and attendance at schools.
