3 SOCIAL SECTORS

3.1 Education

3.1.1 Pre Primary Education

There are 333 pre-primary school classes with 2,283. streams. These classes have a total number of 17,552. children (.9,276. boys and 8,276 girls). Those children are those who are school aged (5 – 6). There are 5 permanent classrooms and .416 teachers.

3.1.2 Primary Education

As per April 2007, Rukwa Region had 341 Primary Schools out of which 340 are public primary schools and 1 non-government. These schools have a total number of 188,672 children (96,327 boys and 92,143.girls). These children are those who are aged 7 – 9). There are 2159. permanent classrooms, 2846 teachers. The region has 2,846 primary school teachers. This translates to a ratio of teacher to students of 1:66 To meet the ideal ratio of 1:40, additional 1,859 teachers are required.. Table 12 shows the number of primary school classrooms, children and teachers by districts.

Table 12 - Number of classrooms, children and teachers

Source: Cluster of Social Services

Academic performance is primary schools is somehow satisfactory. The rate of passing examination in standard IV in 2006 was 84.72% that is higher compared to 2005 (.89.15.%). As for standard VII, the rate increased from 49.53% in 2004, 60.68% in 2005 and 78.53% in 2006.

3.1.3 Post Primary Vocational Technical Training

There are a few Post Primary Vocational Technical Centres in the region offering vocational training.

3.1.4 Secondary Education

The region has a total of 75 secondary schools, among which 65 are public and 10 are privately owned. Public secondary schools have a total of 19,076 students (.11, 794. boys and 8, 286 girls) from Form I – IV. Distribution of secondary schools in each council is as seen in table 13..

Table 13 - Total number of secondary schools in each council

Among these secondary schools, seventy of them provide ‘O' level secondary education and the remaining 5 provide secondary education up to ‘A' level. Total number of students who joined secondary education in public secondary schools increased from 1,827 in 2001 to 8,797 in 2007. Table 14 shows the trend of pupils joining secondary schools from 2001 – 2007. Efforts are directed to increase the number of secondary schools to be able to enroll all pupils who pass their primary schools exams.

Table 14 - Number of pupils joining secondary schools (2001 – 2006)

Source: Cluster of Social Service

3.1.5. Hostels for Boys and Girls

As stated above the region has 75 secondary schools. Only 21 of these schools have hostels, many of them being below standards. Many students walk long distances of up to 9 kms daily to secondary schools. There is therefore a high demand for boarding/hostel facilities. .

3.1.6. Level of Literacy:

Literacy is the ability to read and write with an understanding of a short simple statement on everyday life. According to population and housing census of 2002, there are 908,670 total number of population in five year and above age group in Rukwa Region, out of whom 479,440 or 53 % were literate. Among literates, 55 percent were males and 45 per cent females. Table 15 shows the level of literacy in each council..

Table 15: Level of literacy in each council

Population – five age group and above.

The level of literacy in the region was higher among males than among females. This high level of illiteracy has also contributed to low development of the region.

There are some initiatives being taken to eradicate illiteracy.. The initiatives taken include:

•  Sensitization of Communities and parents towards education and understand the basic rights to unschooled children

•  Sensitization of parents having children not completing primary schools due to various reasons eg. pregnancy, to join a program known as Complimentary Basic Education in Tanzania ( COBET). .

•  Mobilizing adults to join adult classes under a special programme known as Integrated Community Based Adult Education (ICBAE).

3.1.7 Colleges/Universities

Rukwa region has one teachers college namely Sumbawanga Teachers College that produce teachers with grade IIIA and certificates in Domestic Science.

The region has an Open University Centre which came into operation since 21 st September 2000. To date, the centre has already awarded diploma and degrees to 22 candidates in different fields.

OPPORTUNITIES:

1. Existence of enough areas for building secondary schools at ward level
2. Good number of students to join primary and secondary education
3. People who are able to join COBET education programme
4. Availability of Institute of Adult Education centre

OBSTACLES

1. Limited awareness of people on education
2. Shortage of classrooms
3. Scarcity of books and various school requirements
4. Shortage of teachers of various professional especially science subjects
5. Lack of hostels for students
6. Shortage of accommodation facilities for teachers