13 Nov 2016

Parents and Teachers’ Associations (PTA’s) for schools in the North East district have been commended for the role they play in ensuring that a culture of excellence is maintained in schools.
According to Masunga-based chief education officer Ms Angela Matlhape, the PTA’s were highly committed to adding impetus to the efforts made towards sustaining the district’s position at the top in terms of academic performance.
Ms Matlhape, who was speaking during the last day of a two-day workshop for Village Development Committees (VDC’s) held at Chithawa Lodge near Ramokgwebana on November 10, also commended various stakeholders for their contributions towards improving the country’s education.
She noted that the private sector had, through the Adopt-A-School initiative, been doing a lot to assist schools in different ways.
While calling on more businesses to heed this call to help schools at different levels of the education system, Ms Matlhape additionally implored adopted schools to strive for academic excellence as a way of rewarding their sponsors.
She also encouraged schools yet to be adopted to go all out to sell themselves to potential sponsors, noting that it remained the responsibility of the schools to seek sponsors.
Ms Matlhape also patted Non-Governmental Organisations (NGO’s) on the back for also lending a helping hand in efforts aimed at ensuring that teaching and learning went on without disruption.
She observed that some NGO’s such as the Botswana Christian AIDS Intervention Programme (BOCAIP) and the Botswana Substance Abuse Support Network (BOSASNET) often carried out awareness activities to sensitise learners about the dangers of HIV and AIDS as well as drug and substance abuse respectively.
Commenting after the presentation, Kgosi Grace Butale of Butale said it was important for parents to support their school-going children through-out their stay in the education system.
She observed that one of the reasons for the poor performance of learners at junior secondary schools after a good performance at the primary school level was due to peer pressure and the reluctance by parents to play an active role in the lives of their children.
Kgosi Butale pointed out that since many children move to boarding schools for their secondary school education, most parents ceased to play an active role in their children’s lives at that stage.
She thus encouraged parents to make a habit of visiting their children’s schools often to discuss their performance with teachers and help devise ways of assisting them to perform better in their studies.
Tsamaya VDC chairperson, Mr Reginald Mudongo noted with concern that some VDC’s were operating day care centres or had done so in the past, but had not reaped any fruits of such undertakings due to lack of competence in terms of successfully managing such businesses.
He wondered if the Ministry of Basic Education under which early childhood education falls, had a programme through which VDCs desiring to operate day care centres and pre-schools could be assisted. The workshop, hosted by the North East District Council’s Social and Community Development department, brought together VDCs, dikgosi as well as councillors from villages in the eastern side of the district. ENDS