30 Jul 2014

There is no monitoring mechanism at the moment to track students who complete senior secondary education to tertiary institutions according to the primary schools they attended.

Answering a question in parliament on Tuesday, the Assistant Minister of Education and Skills Development, Mr Patrick Masimolole said it was therefore difficult to monitor transition rate of students from individual primary and secondary school to tertiary institutions since progression from senior secondary schools to tertiary institutions is dependent on the students following their different career paths and applying on individual bases to tertiary institutions of their choice.

He said there were no students who dropped out from Tagala and Mahudiri primary schools by reason of long distance they travel. He said from 2013 to2010, the transition of students from the two schools from junior to senior secondary school have been, 69.3 per cent, 58.9 per cent, 69.8 per cent and 50 per cent respectively.

Mr Masimolole was responding to a question from the Member of Parliament for Francistown West, Dr Habaudi Hobona who had asked the Minister to give statistics and per centages of progression of students from Tagala and Mahudiri primary schools in Francistown to senior secondary schools and tertiary institutions, including the University of Botswana in the past 10 years, in view of the distance travelled by Gerald Estates students for their junior secondary school, education and the high likelihood of students drop out. ENDS