Teachers, gov�t deal most welcome
Mmegi Editor | Thursday September 28, 2017 08:42
The two parties have agreed on establishing a legal platform that will be used as a reference point on issues pertaining to invigilation and marking of examinations. This platform will set logistics requirements and payment structures for teachers engaged in all examination-related duties, bringing an end to a stand-off that has contributed to the weakening of the nation’s education system and poor results.
We welcome this development because the absence of a legally binding agreement between the two parties has led to delays whenever discussions around teachers’ remuneration for handling external examinations were concerned. Results for Primary School Leaving Examinations, Junior Certificate, and Botswana General Certificate of Education have not been impressive in the last six or seven years and have been sliding down.
The 2010 examinations were the lowest point of our education system when teachers refused to invigilate, forcing the government to engage unskilled people to perform the task, resulting in embarrassing events and poor results. This is one of the reasons students who did not do well were admitted to senior secondary schools, as the examinations were written under a non-conducive climate, provoking harsh criticism from other stakeholders such as academics and analysts. The poor education system has also impacted negatively on graduates from tertiary institutions, some of whom are not ready to take responsibility in the job market.
We applaud Botswana Sectors of Educators Trade Union (BOSETU) for fighting hard to ensure that teachers were not exploited in performing duties that were not prescribed in the Act that governs the teaching profession. We appreciate the patience that they had to exercise to get their counterparts at the Ministry of Basic Education, especially after the ministry was split into two recently.
Negotiations over working conditions are never an easy task, as it requires compromises from all the negotiating parties with the ultimate goal of having professionals handle the examinations. This should also be used as a learning opportunity for legislators to be broad when they establish oversight institutions such as BEC in future. They should open their eyes when making laws and take on board any potential dispute or scenarios that may arise when such institutions are operational and their needs for human resources.
BEC has for many years been caught in the middle of the war between the ministry and teachers not knowing which way to go, or who to blame. The dispute also trickled down to the students, not only during examination time but also throughout the year, and the consequences were a collapsing education system and illiterate graduates in some instances. Patience and tolerance are what the two parties demonstrated, something that is lacking in many sectors of our population.
Today’s thought
“Indeed, this life is a test. It is a test of many things - of our convictions and priorities, our faith and our faithfulness, our patience and our resilience, and in the end, our ultimate desires”
- Sheri L. Dew