09 Mar 2016

Central region has introduced the silent dropout and action research in schools, Central District Council (CDC) chairperson, Mr Peter Williams, said on Monday.

Mr Williams told a full council meeting that the programme targeted students who went to school on a daily basis but were not benefiting from teaching and learning and eventually became dropouts.,It would be piloted in two schools in each sub-region.

He said the programme adopted a family setting. Mr Williams said leadership and parents were critical stakeholders for the successful implementation of the project.
In an interview central region education director-operations, Mr Sonny Mooketsi, said under this programme, the underperforming students would be identified and placed on a family setting which teachers would be part of.

Mr Mooketsi said in such tailored made family setting, each teacher would be allocated students to whom they would act as parents or guardians.
The director said outside teaching hours, each parent teacher would guide his or her children and interact with them.

Through this meeting or interaction, students would be equipped with life tackling skills such as storytelling and sharing of experiences.

This setting, he said, afforded children or students a platform to discuss anything with parent teachers who would be assuming parental roles. In the process, he said it will be easy to unlock students’ academic capabilities at the same time foiling silent drop out to become complete drop outs. He said the family setting structure in a way bridged the gap consequential of parents not involved in their children education and did not listen to their problems.

The parent teachers of students involved would be linked to the programme, adding that it would be a holistic approach.

Mr Mooketsi argued that where the programme was introduced academic performance has improved, pointing out that the programme was introduced at Pandamantenge Primary School in 2014 and in 2015 they registered zero drop out and improved performance.

He said it was government decision to roll out the programme in the whole country.

In the central region, he said they would start with the greatly affected primary schools adding that the program has been introduced at Mokojwane and Mannathoko primary schools where teachers have been trained.
He said the intention is to roll out the program up to senior school level. Ends