Has Our Education Gone To The Dogs?

Editor | Monday December 15, 2008 00:00

Calls for the Minister of Education to resign have also been heard from certain quarters.
If anyone was ever in doubt of the decline in our tertiary education, GTC, a government-sponsored institution, this week gives us a classic example of the worst case in our tertiary education system.

When students confess that their lecturers and Heads of Department forced them to cheat in order to pass with flying colours, it makes you wonder whether we are still in Botswana, known internationally for its anti-corruption and high moral standards.
The GTC example is a case in point regarding how rotten our tertiary education system has become. 

We salute the students who chose to open up and tell it as it is. Beauty Therapy students tell Monitor that they were awarded high marks for modules and practicals they were never taught! If this matter is not attended to urgently, these students will be awarded certificates of merit in courses they have no idea of.

It is not only the Beauty Therapists who have come forward with this astounding revelation. Students of Fashion Design at GTC also reveal that three of their colleagues were forced to quit a Screen Printing module and encouraged to pass their practicals to other students instead so that the other students pass with flying colours. 

The lecturer, simply put, encouraged the bright students to do the practicals for the others.That students can go for five months without a lecturer and continue to have an absentee lecturer to the point of having to rely on a fellow student is a national disaster and an embarrassment beyond words.

What is beyond belief is that the highest authorities in the Ministry of Education have known about the GTC rot since the beginning of the year.
We are talking about the students who at some point went on a class boycott, forcing the Ministry of Education to close the college. 

We would have hoped that when Minister, Jacob Nkate, agreed to the decision to close the college, he used the time to investigate the causes of student discontent at GTC. It is clear 12 months down the line, that the Ministry of Education, the Department of Vocational Education and Training (DVET), or the college's management have been sitting on the problem, wishing it would go away on its own. 

On Saturday, the poor students were all sent home. Some were told never to come back in the New Year despite the fact that they have not completed their programmes. Yet everything is all A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year at the Ministry of Education.
Since Nkate appears to be failing to crack the whip, is it not time to crack the whip on Nkate himself? And could someone call GTC management to account. If we are still in Botswana, we trust that that can be done. A genuine Merry Christmas to everyone!