Limited school space leaves parents stranded in Moses ||Garoeb Constituency

By Linea Dishena and Daniella Izaaks

Parents and guardians in Windhoek’s Moses ||Garoeb Constituency have been left frustrated by limited spaces in school, especially for Grade 1 learners.

Speaking to Nampa here on Monday, constituency councillor Stefanus Ndengu said limited space is a challenge every year, as the constituency has only four primary schools and two secondary schools catering for its estimated population of 90 000 to 100 000 inhabitants.

“The population is growing and we cannot stop that… What we need is more schools to be built. We need to the Khomas Regional Council and Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture to add more schools,” he said.

The principal of Moses ||Garoeb Primary School, Judith Sepiso, said parents have been flocking to the school looking for space, however due to limited space many children were turned away.

She said the school can only accommodate 1 400 learners, which already means each teacher has about 40 learners in their class, while the ministry’s teacher-learner ratio for grades 1 to 4 is 35 learners.

“I am so scared for our country that we have children who are not going to school at all because they did not get space due to the limited number of schools. We might have some parents who might just go back and sit with their child, which is really a sad situation,” she said.

Sepiso echoed the call for more schools, especially in the informal settlements where population growth is rapid due to rural-urban migration.

Meanwhile, acting principal of the newly established Cuba Primary Project School, Immanuel Nangolo, similarly called for more schools to be constructed. He said another option is to employ more teachers and to allow schools in informal settlements to operate on the plateau system, where some learners attend school in the morning and some in the afternoon.

“Most intakes here are people from the rural areas and some of them are vulnerable children… The capacity of the Cuba project school is 1 260 learners in grades 1 to 7 and the teacher-learner teacher ratio is 38, however some classes have 45 or more learners,” he noted.

A frustrated parent, Annacky Inane, said she has been to all four primary schools in the constituency and other surrounding constituencies, but has not managed to secure a place in Grade 1 for her child.

(NAMPA)
LD/ID/AS
(NAMPA)