/ 27 January 2004

English a passport to success?

A heated debate is underway in Swaziland about whether children who fail English should be forced to repeat the academic year.

”The English language requirement is a millstone around the neck of every Swazi school child,” says Agnes Khumalo, a public school teacher in the northern Hhohho province.

But, businessman Arthur Simelane disagrees. ”You can’t get a good job without a knowledge of English, or succeed in the business world without competence in the international language,” he said.

”If schools fail to teach English correctly, this is the reason for the current crisis. It’s not because Swazi children are stupid. They are not.”

An estimated 15% of secondary school children fail the exams that should earn them a high school qualification because of poor marks on English competency tests. Predictably, those schools that register the highest failure rates in English are the poorer institutions in rural areas, where English is hardly heard in students’ homes.

”Swazi students sit for Oxford Exams (international secondary school examinations administered by Oxford University in Britain) in order to apply for universities. English is the linguistic gold standard of the world, and a child cannot expect to do well without a command of that language,” Marcus Dlamini, a faculty member of a remedial school in the central town of Manzini, says.

Dlamini’s school conducts courses for students who have passed their final high school exams, but whose grades are not good enough to earn them a place at the University of Swaziland ‒ much less more demanding colleges outside the country.

He says that improving students’ English skills is the primary focus of the school.

”You cannot communicate with a non-Swazi speaker unless you know either the person’s native tongue, or an international language like English.”

Dlamini adds, ”Even a SiSwati speaker is adrift in technical conversations, because there are no SiSwati words for most modern concepts. It is a language from an earlier, poetic, agrarian society ‒ very beautiful, but perhaps not that practical.” Siswati is one of Swaziland’s indigenous languages.

However, an increasing number of Swazis is angered by the English language requirement for high school degrees. This group includes parents who invested heavily in their children’s education, and who are frustrated when a single subject holds the child back.

Queries are also being raised by school administrators ‒ particularly those who see their overall pass rates adversely affected by failure in English. At present, the Ministry of Education insists that all subjects must be taught in English. The rationale is that total immersion in English will help children assimilate the second language more efficiently.

Some teachers say privately that they could do better with Swazi children by instructing them in the SiSwati language.

”The rigidity should be dropped, and a compromise should be made. For instance, English should still be a pass/fail subject, but other subjects could be taught in SiSwati where this is appropriate,” said one Mbabane primary school teacher who asked to remain anonymous.

She said her colleagues agreed: ”Such an approach will not only emphasis the importance of English, but will ensure the perpetuation of SiSwati ‒ because it would be used more as an instructional medium in public schools.”

In addition, certain citizens point to the fact that Japan has established itself as an economic powerhouse even though most Japanese are not fluent in English.

Economists might say that a technologically-advanced country like Japan, with its population of 100 million people, has less need of English than agrarian and impoverished Swaziland ‒ which needs to reach out and be heard by the outside world in order to raise living standards. — IPS