EDITORIAL: End congestion, staff shortage in schools

The gripping teacher shortage that has hit public schools could severely compromise the quality of education unless it is quickly sorted out.

The employer, Teachers Service Commission (TSC), says it requires 95,000 more tutors and that the shortage could hit 125,000 in the next three years.

The situation is an unfortunate yet regrettable paradox because, while the government is pushing more students into high school, hoping to achieve 100 per cent transition from primary to secondary education, it is hopelessly unable to match the population surge with the right number of teachers.

Public secondary schools are suffering a shortage of 57,380 teachers and primary schools 30,357.

Since free primary education was introduced in 2003, enrolment has surged but the government is unable to staff the institutions adequately.

Besides, schools are struggling with congestion in classrooms, dormitories, laboratories, libraries and even toilets, painting a rather miserable picture of the country’s public education.

What makes the situation more distressing is that these twin problems — teacher shortage and congestion — are not unforeseen.

They are a natural consequence of the government’s own official policies and need not have occurred.

Simple and prudent planning would have seen the government expand facilities in schools and staff them adequately before herding in hapless learners.

Granted, the problems are not indomitable: They can be resolved easily through massive recruitment of teachers and a huge construction upgrade in schools. Sadly, they are causing untold damage to teachers because of work overload at no extra pay, in addition to frustration at having to deal with an unprecedented learners’ surge.

The learners have to contend with a rather unfriendly environment, where contact between them and the teachers has been reduced to the bare minimum and, for most of their schooling lives, they have virtually been left on their own with little or no counselling on career, social and academic challenges.

Parents, on the other hand, are quickly losing faith in public education, preferring to enrol their children in the better-equipped and generously staffed private schools — at a huge cost.

It is this demand for a private education that has led to an exponential increase in the number of ‘academies’ in the past three years.

Unfortunately, only a few parents can afford it; the bulk of learners are consigned to public schools with poor quality education.

Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha must prioritise the push for more budgetary allocations for teacher recruitment and infrastructure development to guarantee quality learning.