Chinhoyi faces critical shortage of schools

Chinhoyi (Telegraph-New Ziana) – Chinhoyi Urban is facing a critical shortage of both primary and secondary schools, and currently has a deficit of 27 such facilities, a senior government official has said.

Deputy Minister of Primary and Secondary Education Edgar Moyo said Chinhoyi urban required no less than 42 schools, both primary and secondary, to satisfy demand.

At the moment, the area has only 15 schools catering for 21 593 students.
“In Chinhoyi urban, we have 15 schools, 10 which are primary and 5 which are secondary school, catering for 14 462 primary school learners and 7 131 secondary school learners, giving a total of 21 593 learners,” he said.

“Such an enrolment according to the thresholds should be accommodated in 42 schools which comprise of 28 primary and 14 secondary schools and we only have 10 primary schools and 5 secondary schools giving a deficit of 18 primary and 9 secondary schools and a total deficit of 27 schools in Chinhoyi.”

He was speaking at a recent ground-breaking ceremony for two new schools being built in Chinhoyi urban by the Roman Catholic Church.

Moyo commended the Catholic Church for building the schools – one primary and another secondary – saying this will go a long way in addressing the gap in educational facilities in the area.

“The two schools whose ground breaking ceremony we just witnessed today are critical in alleviating this shortage. I am also actually delighted that these schools will also cater for the disadvantaged members of the community,” he said.

He said the school shortage in Chinhoyi urban mirrored the situation in the whole Mashonaland West Province, which also required addressing urgently.
Moyo said the province had a total of 369 secondary and 743 primary schools with an enrolment of a staggering 483 547 students.

This, he said, had led to over-crowding in most of the schools which put pressure on both students and teachers. The situation was expected to worsen this year due to the growing number of learners.

“Over crowded schools tend to stretch resources. Take where a primary school class which is supposed to hold 40 learners is now holding between 50 and 60 learners and the individual learning models cannot be applied in such large classes. As a result quality teaching attainment is affected negatively,” he said.

Moyo appealed to private investors to invest in education, saying government alone could not manage to satisfy demand in the sector.

More immediately, he urged unlicenced schools to regularise their operations to ensure standards.

“I would like to urge all private authorities to register their schools and ensure that their operations are within the prescriptions of this authority. While we commend their efforts for complementing our goal to bring access to education, we are not happy with those who are not registering and are not compliant and we would like you to take a leaf from the Catholic Church,” Moyo said.
Telegraph-New Ziana