05 Mar 2019

Government has been called upon to come up with appropriate interventions for challenges faced by the education system.

Debating the proposed budget allocations for the Ministry of Basic Education on March 4, some Members of Parliament (MPs) said the several problems that the education system was wading through could be solved if appropriate measures were adopted.

While commending the Ministry of Basic Education for the policies it came up with, which he described as well-crafted, MP for Ghanzi North Mr Noah Salakae, nonetheless criticised it for failing to deal with minor problems.

Mr Salakae wondered if the ministry could be able to address issues such as calls for mother-tongue education if it failed to deliver on issues such as the provision of furniture to schools.

The legislator said generally, the education system was collapsing and had been moving towards its collapse for years now.

Also commending the ministry for having partnered with other key stakeholders to help improve results in schools within his constituency, MP for Nkange, Mr Edwin Batshu however noted that the area still needed to be assisted in other ways to address other problems that were yet to be solved.

Of those, he cited the need for boarding facilities at Nkange Junior Secondary School.

He said currently, some learners walked distances as long as 20 kilometres to and from school each day.

For his part, MP for Palapye Mr Moiseraele Goya also hailed the Ministry of Basic Education for having ensured that the country did well in primary education over the past decade.

He however indicated that the automatic progression from primary level posed a challenge and needed to be re-looked into.

Further, he said in terms of progression from junior to senior secondary school level, Botswana still lagged behind as only 50 per cent of learners could progress, adding that the situation would have been better if progression stood at 70 per cent at least.

Mr Goya also commended the ministry for the introduction of pre-primary education in public schools.

However, he said the lack of appropriate inputs for the pre-schoolers could hamper the success of the programme.

MP for Tlokweng, Mr Masego Segokgo complained of over-crowded classes, and appealed for the lowering of the number of learners per class as well as the increasing of the number of teachers so as to reduce class size and address the problem of unemployment.

In addition, Mr Segokgo said the ministry was perpetuating inequity in the distribution of resources to schools, as most often there were discrepancies in the manner in which schools were allocated resources.

MP Wynter Mmolotsi of Francistown South said the ministry was sluggish in finding solutions to its problems, citing shortage of books, teaching aids, and laboratory equipment.

Mr Mmolotsi further noted that automatic progression and bulky classes continued to impact negatively on the education system.

He suggested that classes be split in half in all schools and unemployed graduate teachers be employed to among others allow for teachers to be able to track the performance of individual learners.

Responding to the MPs’ comments, Basic Education minister Mr Bagalatia Arone said the ministry was in the process of addressing most of the problems such as the large class sizes.

The ministry, he said, had since sent a request for new teaching posts to the Directorate of Public Service Management (DPSM), explaining that the ministry’s intention was to address the challenge through the introduction of team teaching. ENDS