Mozambique: Education Ministry fighting to reduce school dropout rate

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Mozambique: Education Ministry fighting to reduce school dropout rate

3:50 CAT | 30 Nov 2020

Photo: MINEDH

Mozambican Education Minister Carmelita Namashulua announced on Friday that her Ministry will strengthen its policies to prevent pupils from dropping out of school.

High dropout and failure rates remained a major challenge, she said, as did ensuring that children enrol in primary school at the right age (children should enrol in primary school in the year of their sixth birthday).

Speaking at the closing session of a meeting in Maputo of the Ministry’s Coordinating Council, Namashulua pointed out that the dropout rate is an important factor behind Mozambique’s high rate of illiteracy.

She said the Ministry has instructed school directors to coordinate closely with local communities to ensure that no child of school age remains outside of school, and that all pupils, particularly those with special educational needs, remain in the school system, at least until they have completed basic education.

Namashulua said that only 78.9 per cent of six year old children are attending school, so over 20 per cent, for whatever reason, are not at school.

To reverse the current scenario, the Minister said, the government is working to recruit more teachers into the system.

But attempts to build and equip more classrooms have failed badly. Namashulua said that so far this year only 1,355 new classrooms have been built, which is 36 per cent of the target figure. The Ministry has acquired 33,875 school desks, which is 60 per cent of the target.

“We repeat that it is indispensable that the planned targets be attained before the end of this year”, Namashulua declared. This means building twice as many classrooms in a month as were built in the first 11 months of 2020.

Source: AIM