MINISTRY OF EDUCATION, SCIENCE, VOCATIONAL TRAINING …

[Pages:27]REPUBLIC OF ZAMBIA

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MINISTRY OF EDUCATION, SCIENCE, VOCATIONAL TRAINING AND EARLY EDUCATION

BIG PUSH: EFA ACCELERATION INITIATIVE

Second Regional Workshop, Luanda, Angola, 18 ? 22 October 2013

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Early Childhood Education (ECE) is the foundation for expanded life chances and for lifelong learning. Participation in early childhood education is far from universal in Zambia. In 2012, of the 508,460 grade 1 entrants, only 94,976 or 18.7 percent had some form of early childhood education.

The Ministry has embarked on the process of providing a regulatory framework within which the delivery of ECE services would be extended, focusing on the development and application of standards and quality control mechanisms.

Primary school enrolment data indicates a growth rate of 11.1% from 2007 to 2012, an increase which has been largely attributed to the introduction of the Free Primary Education Policy (2002) and the growing number of community schools. From 2002 to 2012, statistics indicate that enrolments at primary school level increased from 1.8 million in 2002 to over 3 million in 2012 with close to 50 percent of the enrolled learners being female. Government has also embarked on infrastructure expansion in secondary and tertiary levels so as to absorb the large number of learners who are completing the primary cycle, thereby increasing the transition rates

The Gender parity Index in the primary sub-sector is currently at 1.0. This is a big achievement for the country. On the other hand, the GPI in secondary and tertiary levels is still low. Therefore, efforts to increase the GPI in secondary schools and tertiary institutions will be sustained.

Despite the equitable opportunities created for more children to enter the school system, Zambia has performed poorly on learning achievement over the last decade. The quality of education in Zambia has remained low as revealed by the test and examination results. The large increase in enrolments has been greeted by higher pupil teacher ratios and higher pupil classroom ratios, a state of affairs that has tended to compromise quality.

At the inception of the EFA, there was a lot of enthusiasm by the developed countries to provide assistance to countries in the SSA. However, as years went by there was apparently donor fatigue. Today we have as few as six donors providing support to the Ministry. There is need therefore, for the developed countries to provide additional financial and technical support for Zambia to completely achieve the EFA goals.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .................................................................................................................................. 1 1 INTRODUCTION..................................................................................................................................... 3

1.1 FINDINGS....................................................................................................................................... 5 1.2 Goal 1: ........................................................................................................................................... 5

1.2.1 Achievements (results) ......................................................................................................... 5 1.2.2 Challenges ............................................................................................................................. 5 1.3 Goal 2 ............................................................................................................................................ 6 1.3.1 Achievements (results) ......................................................................................................... 6 1.3.2 Challenges ............................................................................................................................. 7 1.4 Goal 3 ............................................................................................................................................ 8 1.4.1 Achievements (results) ......................................................................................................... 8 1.4.2 Challenges ............................................................................................................................. 8 1.5 Goal 4 ............................................................................................................................................ 9 1.5.1 Achievements (results) ......................................................................................................... 9 1.5.2 Challenges ........................................................................................................................... 10 1.6 Goal 5 .......................................................................................................................................... 10 1.6.1 Achievements (results) ....................................................................................................... 10 1.6.2 Challenges ........................................................................................................................... 11 1.7 Goal 6 .......................................................................................................................................... 11 1.7.1 Achievements (results) ....................................................................................................... 11 1.7.2 Challenges ........................................................................................................................... 12 2 CONCLUSIONS ..................................................................................................................................... 13 3 RECOMMENDATIONS ......................................................................................................................... 14 4 APPENDICES ........................................................................................................................................... i

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1 INTRODUCTION

In 2012/2013, the strategic focus of the sector continued to be the expansion of access to both upper secondary and higher education and improving the quality of education at all levels as well as the improvement of equity in education. Other priorities include the revision of curriculum, capacity development of teachers and placement of teachers in remote rural area. A total of 5,973 new teachers were recruited by December 2012. In 2013, over 4,300 new teachers have been recruited.

Performance at Grade 12 level remained a challenge. A total of 103,853 pupils sat for the examination of which 60,319 (35,453 males, 24,866 females) obtained full certificates, representing 58.1 percent compared to 59.9 percent in 2011. Absenteeism from examinations was equally high; 1,084 candidates (1,084 males, 888 females) absented themselves.

Government, in its efforts to increase access to public universities, expanded infrastructure in all the three public universities (University of Zambia, Copperbelt University and Mulungushi University) in terms of lecture theatres, classrooms and student hostels. As a result of this intervention, the total enrolment in public universities increased from 23,757 in 2011 to 27,925 in 2012. In addition, Government entered into Public Private Partnerships (PPP) to develop various infrastructures at the three universities. Three other universities were earmarked for construction.

A notable challenge experienced was inadequate funding. The proportion of the national discretionary budget allocated to the sector dropped to 17.5 percent in 2013 from 18.6 percent in 2010. This was lower than the Sub Saharan African regional average of 18 percent.

However, the Ministry has been able to secure a grant from the Global Partnership in Education (GPE), whose precursor was the Fast Track Initiative (FTI) was the precursor. The Ministry awarded Programme Implementation Grant in the amount of US$ 35.2 million. The grant was approved by the Global Partnership Board of Directors on 22 May 2013 for a three-year implementation period, subject to the availability of funds. In Zambia, DFID is the Supervising Entity responsible for monitoring disbursement and impact of the GPE. The delivery of quality education services is a key priority for the GPE.

The area of strengthen for Zambia that has developed with regard to the EFA goals is the Zambian government's political will to provide free educations for all. Modalities for making free Education up to secondary level are being devised to be included in the expenditure frameworks for Zambia. While the Political will is there, a phased out approach is being devised. It can be said that strides towards making provision of education free up to secondary level in Zambia have been progressively made with the

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1.1 FINDINGS

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1.2 Goal 1:

1.2.1 Achievements (results) Expanding and improving comprehensive early childhood care and education, especially for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children

Children's education opportunities are shaped long before they enter primary school. The linguistic, cognitive and social skills they develop through Early Childhood Education (ECE) are the foundations for expanded life chances and for lifelong learning. Participation in early childhood education is far from universal in Zambia. In 2012, of the 508,460 grade 1 entrants, only 94,976 or 18.7 percent had some form of early childhood education; an of increase of 3.5 percentage points compared to 15.2 percent reported in 2011.

The Ministry has embarked on the process of providing a regulatory framework within which the delivery of ECE services would be extended, focusing on the development and application of standards and quality control mechanisms. In this regard, minimum standards for the operation of ECE centres and a draft ECE policy were developed, and is about to be approved by Cabinet. The Ministry has also developed the curriculum, guidelines and education materials for ECE.

In addition, the Ministry has for the first time recruited 1,000 ECE teachers to be put on Government payroll. This will inevitably increase the number of children with ECE experience.

The Ministry, in partnership with Cooperating Partners (CPs), has also embarked on the process of establishing ECE centres mainly in rural schools. A total of 171 classrooms in existing primary schools have been rehabilitated for use in ECE facilities in five provinces namely: Western, Muchinga, Eastern, Luapula and Northern, targeting 6,840 children annually. It is hoped that with the increase in ECE enrolment there will be drastic improvement in the early grade reading and numeracy, which has proved to be quite elusive for many years. It is also envisaged that the recruitment of ECE teachers will add some impetus to the quality of education in the sub-sector.

1.2.2 Challenges The training of the teachers for Early Childhood Education was only undertaken in 2 out of the 14 public colleges of education. Consequently the private sector, rather than the

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Ministry, has provided most of the ECE services. Additionally there has not been coordinated supervision and monitoring of ECE centres, a situation that led to different curricula and syllabi being used by various ECE providers.

Another challenge facing the ECE sub-sector has been inadequate ECE centres, especially in rural and remote areas. The ECE sub-sector has not had a single nationally approved syllabus for the ECE providers; a situation that is now being reversed.

The Ministry is also faced with the challenge of poorly qualified ECE teachers. In some instances the teachers are not trained at all.

1.3 Goal 2

1.3.1 Achievements (results) Ensuring that by 2015 all children, particularly girls, children in difficult circumstances and those belonging to ethnic minorities, have access to and complete, free and compulsory primary education of good quality

The past decade has been one of rapid progress towards the Millennium Development Goal of Universal Primary Education (UPE), as well as the Education for All Goals. A remarkable rise in primary school enrolment has been experienced. From 2002 to 2012, statistics indicate that enrolments at primary school level increased from 1.8 million in 2002 to over 3 million in 2012 with close to 50 percent of the enrolled learners being female. More children are reaching the last grade of primary school with the aspiration of going onto secondary education

The number of learners enrolled in primary schools increased by 3.24 per cent to 3,591,736 in 2012 compared to the year 2011. Girl's enrolment stood at 1,783,166 (or 49.6 percent of the total enrolment at this level). This translated to a Gender Parity Index (GPI) of 0.99. This GPI was above the Sub Saharan African regional average of 0.911

The completion rate for primary school level (Grade 7) increased from 103 per cent in 2011 to 107.61 percent in 2012. Because completion rate is the quotient of the number of learners in a grade (minus repeaters) and the official school age population for that grade, when the number of learners who are not of this age is great this rate can exceed 100 per cent as was the case of Zambia at Grade 7.

1UNESCO Institution of Statistics

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A total of 291,018 learners sat for Grade 9 examinations with females accounting for 47.2 percent of these. Out of this number, 53.1 percent (or 154,395 learners) obtained full certificates, with 51.0 percent of them being females.

Primary school enrolment data indicates a growth rate of 11.1% from 2007 to 2012, an increase which has been largely attributed to the introduction of the Free Primary Education Policy (2002) and the growing number of community schools. The total enrolment in 2007 stood at 2,822,759 (male 1,438,011; female 1,384,748). This number rose to 3,135,442 (male 1,568,566; female 1,566,876) in 2012. Other factors responsible for the increase in enrolment figures include:

o The expansion of physical space through infrastructure development; o The implementation of the "Every Child to School" policy since 2008; o Expansion of the School feeding programme in selected hunger-prone districts o Community sensitisation on the importance of education. o The selection of girls into secondary school after the primary cycle based on 50%

for girls irrespective of the performance o Deployment of female teachers to rural schools who act as role models. o The bursary scheme; increase in allocation, and 60% of the allocation targets girls o Construction of weekly boarding facilities in some rural schools o Deployment of qualified teachers, especially in rural areas. o The Uniform policy, where children are not compelled to wear school uniform,

especially if they cannot afford. o Uniform policy, o Introduction of community schools, particularly in areas where there is no

government school nearby

1.3.2 Challenges

Despite the equitable opportunities created for more children to enter the school system, Zambia has performed poorly on learning achievement over the last decade. The most recent data from the 2008 Grade 5 National Assessment reported national mean performance of 35.3 percent in reading in English, 39.4 percent in Mathematics; 40.2 percent in Life Skills and 39.4 percent in Zambian languages. Besides the national assessment, there is growing consensus that children are drifting through the school system without adequately mastering relevant skills. Poor reading skills across all grades are particularly of concern.

The need remains to decrease the high pupil/ teacher ratios (PTRs), increase contact time, which has been in the decline, with children in lower grades only attending 3 hours of school each day, because of schools operating double or triple shift systems. Children exiting primary education have not acquired the basic literacy and numeracy skills they need to be productive in the labour market.

Big Push: EFA Acceleration Initiative2013 [Zambia]

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