Rakesh Rajani
Temeke District in Dar es Salaam leads in the ability of its pupils to read, write and count after scoring an aggregate of 66.8 percent in a research conducted in 126 districts countrywide.
A non-governmental organisation – Uwezo – conducted the research dubbed: ‘Assessment of children’s basic literacy and numeracy’ that involved three subjects – English, Kiswahili and Mathematics.
The research involved pupils aged between 9 and 13 years, according to the head of TWAWEZA Rakesh Rajani who was addressing different education stakeholders.
He said Arusha District came second with a score of 66.1 percent followed by Morogoro Urban (65.4), Songea Urban (65.0) and Kinondoni (64.5).
Other districts that are also in top 10 include Moshi Urban (64.0), Arusha Rural (61.2), Iringa Urban (61.0), Ilemela (60.3) and Njombe Urban (58.4).
The 10 worst districts with their scores in brackets include: Kasulu (21.3), Bariadi (22.9), Serengeti (23.2), Biharamuro (24.2) percent, Tarime (24.2), Musoma and Shinyanga rural both (24.9).
Others are Urambo (25.3), Kilwa (25.5), Handeni (26.2) and Bukombe (26.8).
Rajani said despite significant increase in the education budget, more efforts are needed for the pupils to project better learning results, especially basic literacy and numeracy.
“We know teachers are often not in the classroom for certain reasons including lack of incentives,” Rakesh said.
According to him, neither ministry for Education and Vocational Training nor the government can solve the education crisis on their own.
He said the government and the ministry should take good ideas from stakeholders engaged in academics, business, religion, civil society and media.
Rajani dismissed the argument that the eight subjects that pupils in Tanzania study are too many, pointing out their counterparts in Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda do, eleven, nine and ten respectively and yet the pupils in such countries perform well.
Meanwhile, Education and Vocational Training minister Dr Shukuru Kawambwa said the government has taken concerted efforts to ensure that literacy and numeracy among pupils is improved.
According to Dr Kawambwa the move aims to ensure that the country reaches Big Result Now goals by 2015.
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN
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