11 Mar 2014

The Central District Council chairperson, Mr Lesego Raditanka has said the Ministry of Education and skills development has taken a decision to roll out reception classes in 31 public primary schools across the district.

He said this when delivering his speech at the district’s full council session which commenced on March 10. Mr Raditanka said the reception classes were meant to prepare learners for standard one which would commence the following year.

The programme targeted learners below the age of six. “The pilot project is carried out in schools which have surplus and or extra classrooms,” he said.

Mr Raditanka told councillors that the council was mandated to provide all the teaching, learning materials and infrastructure that suited the learning of the children but due to financial constraints it had not been able to meet all the requirements.

As such the programme was faced with financial challenges and as such the council had asked for funds from the Ministry of Education. He said the ministry was also training extra staff to work as assistant teachers as the children needed much attention.

On the PSLE results the chairman said the district attained 70.2 per cent lower than the national target of 76 per cent while the JCE results also showed a decline of 0.99 per cent as compared to 2012.

He however pointed out that the region had come up with intervention strategies which would be reviewed termly to track process. The arrangement will see such subject specialists visiting up to eight schools in a month. There are five teams made up of inspectors to cover twenty schools per month.

He said a school support group for coaching and mentoring school leaderships and strengthening in-service training had been set up to close gaps. On other issues he said 238 primary schools in the district were supplied with bread from local suppliers with a budget of at least 14 million.

He went on to say that due to financial constraints the council had procured core textbooks only. The books were delivered to all schools at the beginning of January 2014.

Furthermore he said the ministry was faced with classrooms, staff housing and office space shortages in most institutions. He said this was because the MoESD had decentralised its functions to regions and this had led to additional staff that needed accommodation.

As such the district housing unit was unable to meet the demand. ENDS