The draft education and training policy is out with many changes. Of course, given the fact that the same ministry which drafted the policy of 1995 is the same which drafts the present one, much has been inherited. This year’s product is a result of an extensive work which was carried out since 2006 which is almost three years period. The main actors in the facilitation included a task force from various government ministries, relevant government agencies, parastatals and the private sector. The secretariat was composed of members from the education ministry’s policy and planning department. To have an expert eye on the whole thing, a consultant was appointed with assistants for data analysis and interpretation.
The task force was established late in 2006 year by the MoEVT Permanent Secretary Prof. Hamisi Dihenga for the sake of updating the policy to meet local, regional and global challenges in the education sector (vision 2025, the economic growth and poverty reduction strategy, UPE Dakar program of action-2000, MDGs, SADC/commonwealth protocols etc.)
The changes can broadly be clustered to include cross cutting issues, institutional framework and legal framework. The first draft of the policy has been released in June, 2009 with the fundamental new features which are briefly outlined in this and the next feature.
In this feature we will highlight on the changes in the education structure, medium of instruction, student selection, education evaluation and the decentralization by devolution. In the next one we will dwell on the formation of the teachers professional board, the question of students who get pregnant, grade four and form two examinations, school inspection and financing.
The nursery education for under 5 aged children will be provided by all stakeholders but under coordination of the education ministry. The government will set a system of identifying and developing children talents from early childhood. This is a commendable job as it will really set to footing the learner centered teaching which was introduced from primary school level.
In the formal education structure, pre-school will take one instead of two years. So the structure will now be 1-7-4-2-3+ (i.e. one year in pre-school, seven years in primary school, four years in ordinary secondary school, two years in higher secondary school and at least three years in tertiary education). This structure has both advantages and disadvantages.
The advantages include shortening the period in which a person stays in the form education system from at least eighteen to seventeen years. However, much is still desired with the efficiency of the existing system. Once it is improved to make sure that the curriculum implementation is given special attention, then we can further reduce the number of years from seven to even four years. In fact some private schools are already having their students even jump classes once they show a sign of managing to complete the syllabus ahead of the allotted years.
Entrepreneurship was a subject that was avoided in lower levels. It was only introduced from tertiary education levels. It will now be taught from primary schools.
In another improvement, most likely a pressure from privately owned primary schools, English will now be formerly legalized from Pre-primary schools as a medium of instruction. This will also apply in teachers colleges.
While we celebrate for this, there is a serious shortcoming in the sense that our National language has been slashed as the medium of instruction after primary school level. Of course, we understand, the idea to have English medium secondary schools and universities was introduced by one Danish woman who was born in Tanzania.
This lady was even prepared to finance the development of Kiswahili medium post primary education system but her idea was strongly slated by the education ministry. Her idea was based on the fact that changes in the medium of instruction disturbed the learner and, actually, makes one even develop the sense of negativity towards one’s cultures and technologies in favor of cultures and technologies that come along with language used as media of instructions.
In way, once this draft policy is approved, it will take us at least ten years again to have Kiswahili as another medium of instruction as has been the case with pre- and primary schools.
Secondary and higher education has mainly been having only academic streams. In the new policy, vocational education streams will be established from secondary schools to University level alongside with the academic streams.
This is a revolutionary step in this policy because, even the brain engines for industrial revolution in Europe was brought about by people who went through the vocational streams or, more dangerously, through the entrepreneurial “streams” in which they only learn through bitter experiences of trial and error. The inventors of the aircraft, who died in the first trial, is just a typical example. We have others like Albert Einstein who challenges the great thinker’s of the time that matter can neither be created nor destroyed. This cost him dropping from the University.
In the outgoing policy, the selection of students to join form one five and higher education did not stress the necessity for having primary school continuous assessments. This gave a chance for non-government schools to have their own qualifying tests regardless of whether the student passed in his/her grade seven examination. In the proposed policy, student selection to join form one, five and higher education in both government and non-government educational institutions will be based on continuous assessments as well as the National examination results as currently done in secondary schools.
This move will only be good if non-government schools are also invited in the boards to select form one entrants and given a fair chance to enroll students as done with government schools. This means that once a student passes examinations, his/her school fees will be subsidized by the government as done with higher learning institutions through the students loan board (HESLB)
Apart from using primary school continuous assessments as prerequisites for joining higher education, no one will now be employed without showing the primary school academic progress report. Though many will come out and criticize this move, it has one major advantage: all people will now respect primary education as the foundation for further education and employment. This will most likely motivate students to be serious with what is taught as they do in secondary education.
The decentralization by devolution (D by D) approach, the regional, district and ward education officers will now be given full authority on the implementation of the ETP09 in their areas. With the exception of the regional education officer, the rest are under the district councils which are dominated by councilors (diwani).
In the past, only primary schools were coordinated by the district councils. With the coming of the new policy, all educational institutions including secondary schools and tertiary institutions falling in a given geographical area will no longer be supervised by the councils.
The major advantage of this approach is the reduction of bureaucracies in dealing with school issues especially at this time when their number is swelling as days come and go. However, bearing in minds that majority of councilors are illiterate, there is a danger of these educational institutions being mismanaged by virtue of majority vote in the full councils. It may happen in some cases that a decision by a head of school is right but not so in the eyes of a “diwani”.
Having him now holding the “knife’s” handle and the head of school holding the sharp edge, when these tensions arise and each one pulling on his/her side, the danger is for the head of school to fall a victim. So care should be taken to safeguard the head of school lest we dilute further the education quality by having someone illiterate or semi-illiterate supervise an educated person.
The author is a free lance consultant on education management, a school owner, Secretary General to the Tanzania Association of Managers and Owners of Non-Government Schools and Colleges (TAMONGSCO) and a member to the Tanzania National Business Council (TNBC). He is reachable through 0715/54/84-316570 or tamongsco@yahoo.com
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