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MBABANE – Some parents might have sent their children to private schools that do not meet the standards set by the Ministry of Education and Training.
This might be due to the fact that the ministry might have not made the list of complying private schools easily accessible to parents. The ministry is expected to issue this crucial piece of data every academic year in order to ensure that parents enrol their children in schools that have been approved by the line ministry.
The approval is given after several inspections that are conducted by the ministry’s education inspectors. The schools are inspected on the syllabus they offer, teachers, books, structure and other activities offered by that particular school versus the ministry’s check list.
The list is expected to be made available just before the academic year starts. However, this year had been a challenging year for parents because getting the list was difficult. The 2023 academic calendar is on its third week and most learners have been admitted to their schools of choice.
Unavailability
Due to the unavailability of spaces in some schools across the country, some learners end up enrolled in private schools. Some parents were still in the dark about the status of the private schools they had enrolled their children in, because they were not aware of the criteria to follow. Adding, some parents take their children to private schools since they are known to be English medium schools. However, in past years, some of these schools have been found not to be complying.
A visit by this reporter to the Ministry of Education and Training showed how hard it was to get the list of the accredited schools from the ministry. This is contrary to popular expectation that the list should be on the notice board or easily accessible through the website.
At the schools director’s office, the reporter was sent to Eswatini Higher Education Council (ESHEC) to get the list. Worth noting, the director was not at the office but staff members found there had no clue which office was responsible for the list.
Then an attempt was made to inquire about this from ESHEC and this reporter was sent back to the office of the director of schools.
Some of the staff members at the ministry, ended up confirming that the ministry did not have a full list of the complying schools.
In fact, the last time the ministry had a full list was in 2020, following inspections that had been conducted in 2019. The staff members revealed that despite the absence of the compiled list, parents could still contact the ministry and that if they had suspicions on a particular school, then the ministry would do a follow-up. “The list has not been updated in a while due to the events of the past year,” said the staff member.
Results
This was around the time when the external results were made public. At the time the list of top and bottom performing schools and the pass rate they attained was made available. This made it easier to identify schools that were less favourable for children.
In that year, some of the worse performing schools were private schools that were operating without permission. They were not allowed to register for external examinations and they registered their pupils in upgrading centres. After 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic hit the country, the school calendar shifted and results were made private.
Secretary General (SG) of the Eswatini Schools Committees and Parents Association (ESCAPA), Cyprian Dlamini, called for easily access of the list of accredited schools. Dlamini urged the ministry to be transparent with the list because it might save a lot of parent from taking their children to bogus schools. “Imagine paying school fees only to find out that the schools do not comply,” he said.
Dlamini said the list should be pinned at tinkhundla centres even in government offices for easy access. He highlighted that government schools did not have the capacity to absorb all children due to spaces constraints while others discriminated the grade attained by leaners in external examinations. For that reason, Dlamini said parents end up enrolling their children in private schools.