Coltart: US meeting key to education revival

May 21, 2013

New Zimbabwe

By New Zimbabwe Reporter

21 May 2013

EDUCATION Minister Senator David Coltart has said the country is pinning its hopes for the complete revival of the education sector on Wednesday’s Global Partners For Education meeting on the whether to grant Zimbabwe appeal for US$23 million.

Early this year, Zimbabwe appealed for the cash to help finance teacher retraining and the Global Partnership for Education (GPE) board will deliberate on the request at its meeting in Washington DC on Wednesday.

Speaking at his ministry offices in Harare on Tuesday while receiving US$13 million for the Education Transition Fund from the European Union Coltart said: “I cannot certainly say that we are going to get that funding but what I can say is that the Education Transition Fund plays a pivotal role in assisting us in the Ministry to prepare papers that we submitted to the GPE.

“If we secure that funding tomorrow this in turn is going to ensure a countrywide program of teacher re-training.”

The education sector was hit hard over the last decade as Zimbabwe battled a serious economic crisis which saw experienced teachers and other key personnel to leave the country, with most settling most moving overseas while others sought better working conditions in the region.

Meanwhile Coltart also announced that his ministry has completed an audit of the actual number of teachers, school children, drop outs and those attending school throughout the country.

“Very soon I will be announcing the statistics, but for now I cannot divulge because I need to present the audit results to cabinet first, but we are through with that,” he said.

The teacher exodus has been blamed for poor pass-rates in national schools examinations.

Head of the European Delegation in Zimbabwe Ambassador to Zimbabwe Aldo Dell Arriccia said the low examination pass rate in the country was due to underfunding of education by the government.

 “Moreover in the absence of government funds, the burden of financing school costs lays with the families. The result is an unequal education system in which the poorest areas are becoming increasingly disadvantaged,” he said.

“In some cases the poorest children are not able to attend school, as their parents cannot afford the requested levies.”

The November 2012 Ordinary Level results showed that 81,6 percent of the 172,698 who sat for the examinations failed to pass at least five subjects with grade C or better. Only 31,767 of that number were successful, translating to a pass rate of 18,4 percent.