Mp Maele Acts To Breath Life To Ailing Lesenepole Schools
Correspondent | Monday March 4, 2019 13:50
Maele who summoned the village leadership, education officers, teachers, parents and students to a Maduo Pitso on Friday last week, expressed serious concern over the two schools’ results saying last year the primary school was the last amongst all the schools in the region with only 51.7 percentage pass while the junior school got a dissapointing 29.8 percentage pass.
The area MP guaranteed the school that he will be visiting them every quarter to conduct meetings with the schools, Parents Teachers Association (PTA) and the village leadership and will need a report on the progress of the schools’ academic results.
A confident Maele says his efforts to work with poor performing schools in the region in recent years benefited a Goosekgweng Primary school which used to be in a similar conundrum, but is now amongst the best in the country with a 92.3% pass . Maele was upbeat that with the same determination from all concerned stakeholders, including parents and teachers, such a feat would not be beyond the two Lesenepole schools.
Maele who openly confirmed his support for the motion that pupils must repeat standard four and seven said in the past learners managed to do well because they were ashamed of repeating standards.
Meanwhile, the legislator pleaded with parents to support their children by taking care of them at home and assisting them with assignments to ensure that teachers also do not struggle in doing their job. He said children must be reinforced positively in order for them to impress.
On their part the schools’ leadership also shared the same sentiments that the schools were in a bad state as far as academic results were concerned, however they couldn’t clearly indicate what was the root cause of the issue.
Lesenepole Primary School Head, Segametsi Marumo said for the past years they have also been looking for the solution to the problem but in vain. She said it was a pity because it was not just the PSLE results which were poor as the problem was across the board.
Though she said she could not blame shortage of resources as one of the problems as it is a countrywide problem, she said it somehow affects them.
Lack of cooperation amongst teachers and parents was also said to be a matter of concern as well as young parents who abandon their children with their grandparents who cannot assist them with home works. She decried that some parents fail to even come to schools or bring their children’s birth certificates when requested to do so.
Bakgopeng deputy school head, Ontsheletse Pitso said the results needed cooperation of all stakeholders concerned. He said they have introduced groups for learners to work together in trying to solve the situation.
However they he said they were still hindered by teachers working hours as they normally need their supervision of the groups.