Saleshando vows to improve Botswana�s education system

Mpho Maswikila | Tuesday October 14, 2014 08:00

 

BCP president, Dumelang Saleshando, said this during his recent visit to Mahalapye where he lobbied for support for party parliamentary candidates for Mahalapye West and East, David Tshere and Ernest Nthobelang.

Saleshando said it was disheartening that President Ian Khama was not bothered when confronted with a very high student failure rate, because “…to him education is there to prepare youth for future Ipelegeng employment.”

He noted that once elected to power, the BCP would turn the education system around.

He added that his government would introduce pre-schools that will accommodate children from age three, to prepare them to be able to compete internationally with those of the same age, by the time they start Standard One.

He gave as an example, Mauritius, which he said did not have diamonds like Botswana but had the best education system, which produced internationally competitive students.

The BCP president stated that foreign investors interested in education would rather turn to countries like Mauritius where they were sure they would meet bright minds, while companies in need of labourers will eye Botswana as there are more labourers than educated people.

Saleshando said Batswana children were failing, not due to some spell cast upon them, but because the government has designed an education system that will ensure their failure.

He noted the teacher-student ratio as one of the many failures by the BDP to improve education where a class, with one teacher had as many as 40 learners. He said under his government, no class would have more than 25 learners.

“That’s why the popular Maruapula Private School and Gaborone Senior Secondary School (GSSS) are positioned in the same locality and the students from the two schools breath the same air, but when it comes to performance GSSS will trail at 30-40 % pass rate whereas Maruapula will be standing at 90-100% pass rate,” said Saleshando.