Back to Index

Report on the Rapid Assessment of Primary and Secondary Education in Zimbabwe
Sharayi Chakanyuka, Fay King Chung and Trudy Stevenson, National Education Advisory Board (Ministry of Education, Zimbabwe)
September 14, 2009

Download this document
- Word 97  version (546KB)
- Acrobat PDF version (562KB)
If you do not have the free Acrobat reader on your computer, download it from the Adobe website by clicking here.

Executive Summary

The Rapid Assessment of Primary and Secondary Education was conducted to determine the state of education in the country in the first term 2009. The survey was conducted in 120 schools in all ten provinces of the country in twenty districts, two per province. 90 of the schools were primary, while 30 were secondary. Data for the 120 schools were compared for 2003, 2006 and 2009.

Enrolments in the 90 primary schools had remained fairly stable from 2003 to 2009. However there was an increase in the number of teachers, reducing the teacher pupil ratio from 1:39 in 2003 to 1:35.9 in 2009. In the secondary schools in the sample, enrolments were less stable, with an almost 10% drop between 2006 and 2009. The teacher pupil ratio had shrunk from 1:25.6 in 2003 to 1:23.6 in 2009. From a finance perspective, the lower TP ratios increase the unit cost of education.

Whilst primary enrolments has remained stable, national data indicated that a large number of pupils dropped out of primary education or never entered secondary education. For example, the dropout for the 1993 Grade 1 cohort eight years later, in 2000, numbered over 196 000. This large number of dropouts from each cohort poses a serious social and political danger to the country, as these youths do not find employment. The shrinkage of secondary education also raises concerns.

The majority of the teachers in both primary and secondary schools in the sample were qualified teachers holding university degrees and college diplomas. However there were shortages of qualified teachers in A Level classes in mathematics, science and commercial subjects.

Teacher morale was very low in all the schools visited. Teachers were demotivated by low salaries, lack of security in rural areas where teachers became victims of political violence in 2008, lack of accommodation and shortages of teaching and learning resources such as textbooks, stationery. The image of the teacher was at its lowest since Independence. Loss of status from the pauperisation of teachers played an important part in demoralizing teachers, exacerbated by the resentment felt by parents against teachers demanding salary supplements as a result of the State's failure to pay teachers adequately. Yet despite the generally low morale, nearly all teachers were present at the schools during the field visits. Reports that teachers had deserted the profession appeared to be justified as there has been a rapid feminisation of the teaching force at both primary and secondary school level. It appears that qualified male teachers left, but were replaced by qualified female teachers.

The quality of education in schools in the sample was also negatively affected by the lack of accommodation. About 40% of teachers did not have subsidized housing, and half of the subsidized housing available was in a poor state of repair. In particular urban teachers are badly affected, as the tied houses formerly reserved for teachers have been allocated to others. There is a severe shortage of furniture in schools, particularly rural schools. Large numbers of pupils in rural areas do not have a place to sit or to write. Even blackboards and teachers' tables are shared by two teachers. Moreover as much as half of the seats in rural primary schools and 18% in urban schools are damaged and unusable. The situation is even worse in secondary schools. Textbook levels are poor. For example over 20% of the primary schools had no textbooks at all for English, Mathematics and African Language, all compulsory subjects. At secondary level, one third of rural schools had no textbooks for English language, and 22% had no textbooks for Mathematics and Ndebele/Shona, all of which are compulsory subjects.

The Ministry structures at national, provincial and district levels need urgent attention. Due to lack of staff, resources, vehicles and fuel, the Ministry's presence in schools is conspicuous by its absence. Schools are left to manage as best as they can. In schools where there is poor management, the deterioration goes unnoticed and unchecked for corrective measures to be instituted early enough. Damage would have been caused to school facilities and the pupils learning in such schools. In particular it was noted that a large number of the sample schools did not have substantive heads. Lack of training for promoted staff was noted as a problem.

The fees situation was confusing. No meaningful fees had been collected by the time of the study, as parents found the fees announced too high. Parents, who could pay, decided not to do so when they learnt that children would not be sent away from school. The collection of levies was also slow. Schools were operating on very minimal budgets in areas where fees were chargeable. There was still confusion in schools with the announcement of the low fees for the second term. Contradictory statements from the Ministry confused parents. The new phenomenon of parents bearing the burden of educating their children appears too heavy for most low income parents who now have to pay teacher incentives to ensure that their children get some reasonable level of education. The Ministry needs to rethink the effect of the fee paying regime on the Millennium Development Goal of basic education for all by 2015.

The State's inability to pay its teachers adequately needs to be addressed. One approach is to charge fees to enable parents to contribute to teachers' salary supplements and incentives. This is a highly unpopular approach, as an estimated 66% of the population are indigent, and cannot afford to pay even low fees. A possible approach is for the State and for donors to subsidize the indigent communities, whilst allowing those who can afford to pay to do so, thus sharing the burden between the State, donors and the better off citizens.

The lack of regulations regarding teacher incentives has exacerbated the conflict between teachers and parents. There is need for the Ministry to institute regulations which can assist in resolving these challenges. In particular there is need to revise the Statutory Instruments regarding parental schools committees, known as SDAs and SDCs. These Statutory Instruments are now outdated, and do not address current challenges. In general school fees and school levies need to be united into one fee, governed by transparent regulations, and controlled at school level, with clear decision making processes and responsibilities for both the school and the parental leadership structures.

An estimated 25% of school children are orphans and vulnerable children. There is urgent need for this challenge to be addressed by the Ministry, including through its data collection system, in-service teacher updating and upgrading, counselling and career guidance, technical and vocational education, improvement of the teaching so that these OVCs are able to find employment after school, etc. There is need for better coordination between Social Welfare, Education and donors, to ensure that OVCs are well catered for.

Three special schools were part of the sample. Government assistance for children requiring special education has shrunk considerably over the past decade. Only a fraction of the children requiring special education are presently being catered for. Where donor aid is not forthcoming, such schools are operating with serious hardships. There is need for the curriculum and examinations to be adjust to the needs of children with different types of disabilities, such as the blind and the deaf. There is also need for more vocational and technical education, so that they have a chance to be gainfully employed after leaving school. There should be more support for sheltered employment after school. Additional support mechanism need to be restored so that pupils have as much support as necessary for them to succeed in their education. In particular physically handicapped children are not well catered for at present, as the responsibility for special education is under Psychological Services.

Public and private sector collaboration is needed to ensure that high quality relevant teaching learning materials are produced. The close collaboration in these sectors should be reinforced, including through donor support being channelled to strengthen the technology and equipment of the private sector.

Conclusions

The Rapid Assessment focused on a number of problem areas and challenges which require immediate attention. Despite the limitations of a study done in such a short space of time, it provided a snap shot of the situation and the immediate steps needed to stabilize and improve the situation of education as a whole. At the same time, it made clear that a more in-depth approach is needed in the longer term. For example major inputs are required to improve the condition and morale of teachers who will always remain key players within the education system. These include repairing the damaged status of teachers and the problematic relationship which has developed between parents and teachers due to the fact that parents, including very poor parents, were forced by circumstances to take over responsibility for teachers' remuneration during the period when the State was unable to fulfil its obligations in this regard. The staffing and resourcing of the MOESAC have been seriously affected, and need both re-structuring and updating. The shortage of resources for the education sector has to be seriously addressed and stabilized primarily by the State, assisted by donors and parents. At the same time, there has been major erosion of educational infrastructure which needs to be addressed. The provision of teaching learning materials has deteriorated to the extent that the industries servicing the education sector are no longer able to do so optimally.

Download the full document

Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.

TOP