Access to quality education is said to be compromised due to lack of adequate classrooms in the country.
Chikweo Primary School head teacher, Bruno Tchaka in the area of traditional authority Chikweo, Machinga District made the sentiments in an interview when he was reacting to the construction of new school block courtesy of Governance to Enable Service Delivery (GESD) project.
Tchaka said the school has failed to live to the expectations of the community in terms of performance and retention due to inadequate classrooms for the learners times who most of the times learn under the tree.
“Going by the recommended ratio of one teacher to 60 pupils, we were supposed to have at least a total of 31 classrooms, however we ha 16 classrooms only to cater for 1893 learners. This has been compromising quality service delivery,” said Tchaka.
He said due to congestion in classes, most learners were learning under the tree and some of them opted to drop out of school.
“Education infrastructure like classrooms is crucial element for conducive learning environment in schools. There is strong evidence that high-quality infrastructure facilitates better instruction, improves student outcomes, and reduces dropout rates, among other benefits.
He further said teachers’ morale for teaching becomes very undesirable hence affecting service delivery or performance.
“Teachers become demoralized to always teach the congested classes. This has always being the challenge to the school,” said the head teacher.
Tchaka noted that the construction of the new classroom block through the GESD funds, will try to ease the classroom challenges and ensure that quality education is delivered at the school.
“We are very much happy and appreciative for the new classroom block which is being constructed by government with funds from GESD. It will ease the pressure on the inadequate classrooms. The new block will motivate both teachers and pupils hence improve service delivery,” he concluded.
Group village head Kanjinga representing senior group village head Chikweo where the school is located, said as community are very satisfied with the construction works and have provided unweaving support.
He said the new school block will make the learners to love their lessons as the environment will be quite different.
One of the learner who is in standard 8 said the new classroom block will motivate them so that they work extra hard.
She said, she is very mindful that come very shortly, they will move to the new block before they sat for their Malawi school leaving certificate.
“As pupils, we are very happy with the construction of the school block. The learning environment will change for the better. We will achieve more,” she said.
Group village head Kanjinga therefore asked government and other stakeholders to consider building other school blocks so that the school should have enough learning classrooms.
“We really appreciate the good work done by government through GESD project. Our children will love to go to school and progress well. Congestion in classrooms has always been a limiting factor for them to attain meaningful education.
“We are asking government and other stakeholders to consider building us another school block as the issue of inadequate blocks still remains a challenge despite the coming in of this block,” he explained.
Chikweo school block construction project management committee chairperson Martha Kambenji echoed the sentiments made by both the head teacher and the group village head saying the construction of the school block will ease the classroom challenges the school has been experiencing.
GESD aims to strengthen core national and local governance institutions to improve efficiency, equity and accountability of the public resources for devolved services.
Story contributor: Martin Chiwanda, District Information Officer, Machinga
