12 Jul 2022

Infrastructure at Gaborone West Junior Secondary School is inadequate for the school’s current enrollment, says Assistant Minister of Education , Ms Nnaniki Makwinja.

Answering a question in Parliament on Monday, Ms Makwinja said the school’s current enrollment of 814 pupils required a 27 stream school. She, however, said there were no previous plans to expand the school with additional infrastructure.

“My ministry has not in previous NDPs (National Development Plans) provided for the expansion of Gaborone West Junior Secondary School to cater for existing enrollment. Rather the ministry has proposed for the construction of a new school in Gaborone to cater for growth of enrollment,” said the assistant minister.

She said the construction of a new school would hopefully be financed during NDP 12.

Ms Makwinja said the ministry was aware that the science laboratory at Gaborone West JSS required replacement of tables with new ones. She added that the ministry was also aware that the design and technology laboratory required sets of additional tools, computers as well as multi media projectors and printers.

“We have disbursed funds to all our schools for the 2022/23 financial year and we hope that with proper prioritisation, some of these needs would be addressed,” said the assistant minister.

She said the ministry was, however, not aware of any shortage of furniture at the school. She however admitted that the school had a challenge of bandwidth at its computer laboratory. 

“My ministry is being assisted by the Smart Bots Initiative to increase bandwidth and provide WiFi access across the whole school and the plan also provides for the supply of tablets to teachers and learners in 2023/24 financial year,” said the assistant minister.

Gaborone Bonnington South MP, Mr Christian Greeff had asked whether the minister was aware that the school had expanded from 12 to 22 streams over the years with no additional infrastructure. He wanted to know when additional classrooms would be constructed to alleviate a shortage of 10 classrooms at the school. Ends