EDUCATION MESS Schools hit by severe absence of basic educational resources
Students and teachers have no chairs, books, stationery Ministry blames slow response to procurement processes
The Ministry of Education is seemingly at pains to explain why there is noticeable and in some cases, severe absence of educational resources in schools. Instead they are placing the blame squarely on logistical constraints, procurement processes and slow response to financial requests.
Coming into 2024, some parents are expected to buy their children chairs to use in schools or they will be taught while standing. This is just one of the many problems engulfing the education system in the country.
There are no books, which means that parents have to buy a minimum of seven notebooks for one child and also buy full stationery to be used in school. There is shortage of textbooks and students are forced to share.
In some instances, teachers have been sending parents text book content to be reproduced by printing in A4 papers. This is an illegal act, which this publication has observed is happening in several schools.
When asked about it, teachers say it is either that or the students will suffer.
Reproducing textbooks means for a 100-page textbook, one book costs over P200. In addition to reproducing books, there is revision content that also requires parents to make copies of that to aid student learning.
Schools reopened from Christmas holidays last week and The Midweek Sun attended new students (Form 1) school orientations in several schools in Gaborone and surrounding areas to appreciate the financial health of schools.
The orientations were attended by students, parents and teachers. Across all schools, authorities used the opportunity to emphasise that they are “struggling financially,” hence they request parents to rescue schools, failing which their children will suffer greatly.
Parents whose children attend government schools are beginning to feel the pinch as education costs slowly but surely stiffen up as years go by.
Among other noticeable struggles, parents were made aware that some schools have no food to give students, as a result, for the next coming days, parents need to see to it that their children come to school with lunch boxes or they will starve.
It was evident through murmurs from parents that they feel education costs have significantly risen over the years.
They complained of how they can barely cope with costs of buying full school uniform for students, as demanded by schools then pay development fees and toilet cleaning fees in cash that is demanded by the Parents Teachers Associations (PTA).
This publication has established that in most secondary schools, parents are expected to pay P500 or more as development and toilet cleaning fees, which money has to strictly be paid when students report for school at the beginning of the year.
The development fees are managed by PTAs and the amount varies per school.
Moreover, the schools are also demanding P300 per year as school fees for students in Junior School and P450 per year for those children in senior school. Unlike development fees, school fees have flexible payment options in that parents can choose to pay the fees in instalments based on affordability.
In the past, Batswana sat comfortably as government paid for everything, from feeding to providing students with books and stationery. All that parents did was to buy uniform and send their children to school.
Meanwhile, the education Ministry received a massive budget of P10 billion from government for the 2023/2024 financial year.
When asked by this publication if the Ministry is financially struggling, the Ministry responded in the negative but went on to contradict itself when asked why parents are being made to buy cleaning equipment.
The Ministry said the budget is not always adequate. It further put the blame on limited supply of resources, logistical constraints, procurement processes and slow response to financial requests.
The Ministry downplayed the lack of resources in schools saying government is responsible for buying stationery and furniture and to augment government efforts, parents are requested to provide “small items such as stationery.”
The Ministry did not deny that teachers have no chairs to sit on, saying they provide furniture and in situations where there are shortages, additional furniture is procured as funds and the supply chain permit.
Moreover, the Ministry said they introduced cost sharing where parents pay 5percent of the total education cost per child with intentions of encouraging parents to take an active interest in the education of their children.
The monies, it said, are used to
support education and schools.
On teachers making parents illegally reproduce textbooks, the Ministry said they budget for textbook buying but they are faced with a challenge of completing students not being able to return books to school after completing studies.
“Where textbooks or any publications are used, the Ministry encourages the use of such reference materials within the existing copyright law,” the Ministry said.
Meanwhile, teachers who spoke to this publication said the lack of furniture does not only affect students as they too are now bringing chairs from their homes to sit on.
In some instances, some bring camping chairs to school and keep them in staff rooms because office chairs are broken and damaged. They buy themselves pens for marking and markers for writing on the board.
“It is a great struggle, students have no chairs and this is why some schools are doing double shifts.
It’s a complete mess, regarding the development fees, it is common in most schools that the money is mismanaged.
“If used properly those were supposed to be funds that could help during rainy days,” they said.
Reached for comment, Chairperson of the National Parents Association, Modise Keaboka admitted that the development fees are usually mismanaged.
“There are rotten tomatoes in some schools, if the money was utilised properly, it could help buy books and food for students, while schools wait on government funding. Sadly, some associations do not know how to manage the finances,” he said. He explained that parents now need to pay for toilet cleaning as schools have stopped using students to clean toilets but instead use cleaning companies.
However, not all parents pay and there is no way they can help schools to buy what is needed when the offers run dry.