Education for all remains a mirage

GOVERNMENT’S allocation for the education sector decreased from 16,5% in 2021 to 13,4% in 2022. It further falls short of the 20% Dakar Education for All commitment.

At the same time, school fees in Zimbabwe have become relatively expensive considering the salaries of most civil servants.

Boarding schools are averaging a minimum US$300 or equivalent in local currency while secondary day schools charge about US$30 per term in urban centres.

Examination fees have also gone beyond the reach of the majority as “O” Level examinations are priced at US$15 per subject.

These charges hinder access to education, especially for the marginalised poor children.

To this end, over 30 000 students failed to register for the Zimbabwe Schools Examination Council examinations and this undermines universal access to education, particularly for girls and children from resource-poor backgrounds.

It is also against government’s commitment to have an optimum human capital by 2030, as outlined in the National Development Strategy 1 (NDS1).

Exchange rate disparities in a highly inflationary environment have contributed to steep price hikes for the goods and services necessary for children to access education particularly transport, uniforms and gadgets for remote learning.

As wages have also gone down significantly, workers such as the majority of civil servants who earn in local currency, have faced serious challenges in facilitating access to educational and complimentary schooling activities paid for in foreign currency.

The hardships have been further exacerbated by the fact that there continues to exist a huge mismatch between salaries and the poverty datum line.

Be that as it may, the Zimbabwean economy is highly informal, with over 80% of people depending on it.

The informal economy is still struggling to recover from the impact of the pandemic, yet the majority of schoolchildren’s parents depend on it.

This attests to the difficulties Zimbabweans are encountering in paying school and examination fees.

The decline in government’s education spending has affected the once-glorified Basic Education Assistance Module (BEAM), thereby limiting its coverage.

This has worsened inequalities in access to education as many children in turn fail to pay for school and examination fees.

In 2019, government supported 415 000 children under BEAM and the coverage increased to one million in 2020.

Next year, government will support 1,5 million children against 4,6 million children in need of formal and informal education.

The BEAM facility has also been found wanting as it is now failing to pay for children’s examination fees.

All this is due to reduction in government’s education spending, which is also low among regional peers.