Martin Mubanga’s parents have changed his schools twice this year, because his class got too large, 15 pupils. ”What’s the point of sending your child to an expensive school if it’s going to be crowded,” says his mother Elizabeth.
Up to 15 pupils in a class might not be considered ”crowded” by most schools but for Mubanga’s type of school — tuition centres, offering one-on-one teaching, anything over 10 a class is definitely one too many.
Tuition centres have become the rage in Zambia. The centres offer what would appear to be dream schools. Small classes with individual attention from teachers, concentration on weak subjects and to top it all British accredited examinations: O level and A level.
Zambia, which gained independence from Britain in 1964, has its own version of the O level, which is acceptable only in the country.
Students who go on to study abroad either have to sit another entrance test or sit for their O level examinations at accredited centres, usually the British Council. To sit for the examinations they have to follow the British syllabus which the tuition centres offer.
Elizabeth says apart from the fact that Mubanga will go to university abroad, she has to make sure that he passes well in his chosen subjects and, therefore, needs close supervision.
”He was getting away with just mere passes and needed to buck up. That is why I opted for tuition centres,” she says.
But her sister, Nathalie Kaunda, says tuition centres should be just that — centres for extra tuition for children having difficulty in certain subjects. She says children going to the centres fulltime are simply learning how to pass an exam and are not getting an education. Teacher at a private school Elias Nyanthandu says initially teachers offered to give struggling students extra tuition to top up their meagre income.
”All of a sudden it became institutional and now the learning centres are taking full time students,” he says.
Nyanthandu says while it is fine for students, who are in the completing years and want to obtain UK accreditation, he has a problem with children in elementary grades being in learning centres.
There is no socialisation, no sports, no engagement in arts and very rarely do the pupils develop a competitive spirit or leadership skills.
Nyanthandu also says children with special needs like special talents or learning difficulties are not diagnosed correctly or not provided with the relevant curriculum or effective practice. Children from this schooling system find it difficult to cope at
institutions of higher learning where they have to use independent analysis because they have been conditioned to merely passing exams, he says.
Head of a tuition centre Annita Deasai argues the centres are filling the gap left by a crumbling state-provided education system on the one hand, and exploitative private schooling on the other.
She says at present, Zambia faces two major challenges in education: access and quality education that is relevant to the needs of learners and society.
”Our institutions provide good quality education with one-on-one teaching. We are accessible to those that can afford it. We are also the only centres accredited to the British Council to teach the British curriculum. Of course, our aim is to make the children pass their exams, but to do that we will have taught them appropriately. The standards of government schools have fallen so badly children are hardly getting any kind of education at all,” she says.
There are 4 500 government-run schools and only about 34 196 teachers, meaning less than 8 teachers per school. Teachers are demotivated. Strikes are frequent due to delays in salaries and even then, remuneration is poor, less than $100 per month.
There is a low pass rate in the final year. To turn around the low enrolment and retention rate, the government introduced a free education for all policy in which pupils are no longer required to pay school fees up to grade seven and do not have to wear uniforms. But this has not helped very much, out of the 4 500 students who
sat for their final year exams only 2 100 managed to attain full certificates.
Many argue that even in this dire scenario, tuition centres are not the answer.
Bandawe Banda, a teacher at a private school, says because the centres are not schools, they are not monitored and are run by non-academics whose qualifications are not verified.
”We just see teachers moving from one tuition centre to the next looking for the best money, there is no consistency and no monitoring,” he says.
But Oswald Mwansa, an inspector from the Ministry of Education, says the centres are regulated just like other private schools and are also rated according to the service they provide.
”We cannot stop parents from sending their children to these centres, especially those who want the UK certificates. It is true that we do not have any control over their syllabus since it is from the United Kingdom, we just make sure that the public is given information to make informed decisions,” he says.
Gertrude Phiri (16) who completed her A level at a tuition centre, says she would not have been able to do so well in her studies if she had not gone to a centre.
”Here it was intensive. I had access to the teachers at all times and did not waste too much time on extra-curricula activities which I was not interested in the first place. I also finished the O level course in one and half years instead of three,” she says.
Mwansa, from the Ministry of Education, says the argument that tuition centres are exploitative is neither here nor there because private schools charge upwards of $3 000 per term. Tuition centres would appear to be the middle ground, they charge from $200 to $300 per term.
”Tuition centres are providing a service that is needed. There should be no hard feelings about this,” he says. – Sapa-IPS