06 Jun 2013

Education and skills development (MoESD) minister, Dr Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi says by the end of this year, there will be a teaching council that will help the ministry make decisions on issues pertaining to the teaching profession.

“My wish is for the teaching council to be guided by teachers as they best know their limitations and strengths,” Dr Pelonomi Venson-Moitoi said when adressing teachers and non-teaching staff from schools within the North West region in Maun.

Her wish, she said, was to have the law that sets up the council pass through Parliament and be operational beginning of next year. She said issues such as progression of teachers would be looked at by the council.

She further said when she first took office in 2009 as the minister responsible for education, her biggest wish was to restore dignity into the teaching profession. “Back when I started school, teachers were respected and feared, hence I still have that wish of bringing back dignity into teaching - and we can still do that,” said the minister.

Dr Venson-Moitoi further informed teachers that the discussion with unions on the level of operation for teachers should be concluded by end of July. “It will roughly cost government P644 million,” she said.

She further said her ministry had to borrow money from its training programme to augment the money they would need for paying teachers’ level of operation, hence the number of teachers to be sent for further training would go down significantly.

“Last year we sent close to 2 000 teachers for further training and this year I do not even know how many we will be able to train,” she said. Dr Venson-Moitoi further said they had bought 35 houses from Botswana Housing Corporation in Maun to help with the shortage of accommodation for teachers.

“We will continue to buy when houses and money are available,” she said. On the issue of maintenance of schools, Dr Venson-Moitoi said this year her ministry had been allocated P900 million to maintain schools and urged the teachers to engage local brigades for such minor works.

ENDS