27 Jul 2014

The idea of establishing partnerships between schools in the United Kingdom and Africa is bearing fruit.

A number of schools in this Botswana are gradually benefiting from the British Council’s “Connecting Classrooms” Programme which sought to form partnerships between schools in the UK and Africa.

Lerala JSS has also become one of the fortunate schools to find a partner, Hutchesons Grammar School in Scotland.

This partnership is still new but students of both schools are already enthusiastic to make the partnership a success and time and again are communicating with each other and sharing their experiences.

A Hutchesons Grammar school student who was on vacation in Botswana, Amy Stewart,  on July 24 visited her friends at Lerala JSS. 

She informed the local students about the importance of education and urged them to work hard in order to realise their dreams.

She said without education she and other students will not be able to achieve what they want in life. Amy encouraged her fellow students to make a study time-table to make it easier to study for various subjects.

The coordinator of the partnership at Lerala CJSS, Ms Gaafele Kedidimetse welcomed the partnership saying that it is going to help the local students improve their academic results as they interact and share best learning practices.

She said the partnership comes at a time when her school was grappling with improving its JC examination results. 

The school scored 70 per cent pass rate in the 2013 JC examinations against the 87 per cent pass rate target.

She said the partnership is also going to benefit teachers of both schools as they will be sharing best teaching practices which will help teachers move away from the traditional teacher centred methods of teaching to modern learner centred methods of teaching.

She said the partnership is also a form of cultural exchange hence students of both schools will get to learn and appreciate each other’s cultures.

Ms Kedidimetse who is also an English teacher at Lerala CJSS said the partnership is still at an infant stage but her school was already making some remarkable trends to make the partnership a success.

She said the students were already communicating with their friends at Hutchesons Grammar School through the Internet and social media. 

The partnership is expected to bring about school visits to Botswana and Scotland. ENDS