2 teachers, no head teacher at Mthunzini High
MBABANE – The need for teachers in the kingdom is evident as Mthunzini High School has only two teachers and no head teacher.
The school is situated in the Shiselweni Region and there are 41 pupils in Form I and the other classrooms are yet to be occupied. The only two available teachers are qualified in languages.
According to an impeccable source, who requested to remain anonymous, the two teachers were overworked since they also taught other subjects outside those they were qualified for. He said subjects like Business studies, Sciences and Mathematics were not taught in the school due to the lack of teachers.
Hard
“The pupils in that school have had it hard as there are some subjects they have not done since the school began operating in the beginning of the year. These include Business studies, Sciences and Mathematics as the two teachers in the school studied languages.
“The school has not had a head teacher and currently it is being assisted by a head teacher from a neighbouring school, who is responsible for the administration work at the school,” the source said.
He said after requesting the Ministry of Education and
Training to provide more teachers, the ministry promised to do so but did not deliver on their promise. He also said they were told that the ministry currently could not hire more teachers.
Furthermore, he added that as a result, some parents resorted to removing their children from class to start over next year.
A parent of a pupil in the school stated that the only reason she had allowed her child to continue attending classes was because she did not want her to stay at home and do nothing.
She said her child would repeat Form I next year as she had not learnt all the subjects.
“We had hopes that as per the promise of the ministry, we would soon be getting teachers at the school. This means another year wasted as it is obvious that our children will have to repeat this class next year. It will also affect the children mentally even if they are smart, they will still have to repeat this class,” she said.
Vacancies
She further mentioned that she hoped that the ministry would fill the vacancies as children in the school were being negatively affected.
Shiselweni Regional Educations Officer (REO) Siboniso
Gumbi said he was aware of the problem and his office was working towards resolving it.
“We are aware of the issue and we have reported it to the ministry. We are currently hoping that soon the ministry will bring new teachers to fill the vacancies in order for the pupils to learn all the subjects.”
Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT) Secretary General Sikelela Dlamini said the issue of hiring of teachers had been among their main focus as a union.
He said this was because they had seen the need as most teachers were overworked due to teaching more pupils than they should be.
“The SNAT collective is intensely apprehensive about the dire shortage of teachers in schools in the country. This situation started many years ago but reached maximum intensity during the COVID-19 era.
“SNAT had been making clarion calls to government, the biggest employer and owner of the over 933 public schools (primary and secondary), to employ and place adequate educators in the various schools.
“Our calls have never been adhered to by the central government, which continuously cites cash liquidity problems. Our analysis, as educators, reveals that the problems engulfing our education system are multifaceted and, therefore, cannot be attributable to only the shortage of teachers in schools.
Problem
“But even if we were to zoom in on the foregoing problem, as we hereby do, we will realise that it has intricate parts which can never be overlooked,” he said.
Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Education and Training Bheki Gama said the ministry was aware of the issue and were currently working on it.
Gama said the ministry was looking into hiring the relevant teachers.
“We have been made aware of the issue in the school. We will be sorting it out soon, as we will be hiring teachers to fill the vacancies. We are also looking into trying to evenly distribute the teachers as upon our observation, we saw that while some schools have a shortage of teachers, others have more teachers than there should be,” he said.
This publication reported on Tuesday that Minister of Finance Neal Rijkenberg said Cabinet had approved a waiver to allow for the hiring of over 100 teachers. He said this was part of government’s plan to allow key sectors of the economy to function effectively, even in light of the hiring freeze in government.
Expenditure
“The hiring freeze has helped us to reduce expenditure to an acceptable path. We still want to be flexible, hence the decision to allow for a waiver in the hiring of teachers, members of staff in the Judiciary, and other sectors,” he said.
Rijkenberg also revealed that government was considering the feasibility of introducing free secondary school education. He said 50 per cent of the children who made it through primary school dropped out due to unavailability of resources to enrol in secondary school.
“We currently have a 95 per cent intake at primary schools, which is a high number. However, it does not make sense for half of these children not to be able to continue with their education afterwards. Government is working on a plan to address that, but all will be informed by the availability of finances,” he said.