In Ethiopia, the history of modern education dates back 100 plus years when Emperor Menelik II established the first modern school in his name, Menelik II School, in Oct 1908. As historical accounts stated, religious education contributed a leading role towards expanding literacy before the introduction of modern education in the country.
Currently, the number of education institutions is increasing year after year and children, including those living in remote areas of the country, are accessing education at their door steps. In fact, even though schools are expanding throughout the country; there are still unreached areas where some limitations are still witnessed in expanding schools and accessing education.
Additionally, ensuring the quality of education has become the central question of the society. For this reason, addressing the issue of quality education has remained the critical agenda of the government, students, teachers, and the public at large.
Recently, the Ethiopian government has announced a new initiative that sought to improve the quality of education and modernize schools.
Regarding this, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD) said that modern schools lay the foundation for better Ethiopia. Thus, efforts are underway to realize this objective through the active participation of pertinent stakeholders. The participation of the Ethiopian Diasporas community is also sought to contribute their part towards modernizing schools in the country.
Accordingly, Ethiopia’s hope for prosperity would not be attainable without modern educational facilities.
The Premier called on the public to actively participate in modernizing schools and putting the country’s future in a solid base. Launching the national campaign held under the theme “Education for Generations” last week, the Premier noted that without the expansion of education, Ethiopia cannot be competitive on the global stage. “We must fulfill what is expected of us regarding education and to build an advanced Ethiopia, let us build advanced schools together.”
“All of you who have studied in any part of Ethiopia, the schools you studied in yesterday need your support today. If the people, the government and charitable individuals and organizations do not work together to expand education, it will be impossible to be competitive in the future world.”
Abiy further pointed out that the national movement to improve the standard of schools is capable of improving the quality of education. In order to show our support in practice, we all need to participate in the “Education for the Generation” national movement, which enables us to devote our thoughts, capital, and energy to schools.”
“If we cannot change the existing education system, we will not be able to create a competitive country and generation in the future. To this effect and improving the infrastructure of schools, the Ministry held the first platform that targets to hold a national public movement.
Education Prof. Berhanu Nega, on his part said that improving and building education infrastructure is not a responsibility that will be left to the government alone. The movement is where alumni, famous individuals, Ethiopians living abroad, investors and other members of the society contribute to the completion of the infrastructure of schools in their place of birth, where they learned and where they work.
Prof. Berhanu further stated that the movement also aims to enhance the community’s involvement in ensuring quality education. In related development, the Ministry launched a web-portal that displays the detailed information of the 50,000 schools across the country.
According to the Minister, the Ministry is working to promote public participation in education quality. The Ministry will hold a nationwide public movement that aims to make schools more suitable for the teaching-learning process and thereby to improve their standards.
“The need to create a sustainable system to improve schools’ infrastructure has become the order of the day. The movement will involve people living abroad, investors, famous individuals, associations, private and public institutions, development partners, government bodies at all levels and others,” he said.
Accordingly, the purpose of the national movement is to improve the infrastructure of the schools through the participation of the society at all levels and to enable the community to take ownership of the learning process regardless of the improvement of the infrastructure in the education system.
Although the causes for low quality education are diverse and complex, absence of schools with the desired amenities and infrastructure is one of the main challenges. Hence, the Ministry plans to equip over 50,000 schools with necessary infrastructure within five years thereby ensuring quality education.
Out of more than 50,000 schools in the country, over 86 percent primary and middle schools and more than 71 percent high schools do not have the necessary infrastructure for decent teaching and learning process.
“The problem inevitably made students at all levels not to bring the required knowledge, skills and behavioral changes. Leaving the problem entirely for the government may take no less than three or four decades. Thus, it needs the direct efforts of the society and various stakeholders from the education sector.”
Likewise, the movement aspires to have more schools that have well infrastructure, clean water, chairs, tables, sports fields, books, electric power, libraries, and laboratories, among others. Moreover, the movement would allow the different sections of the society to contribute what they can to education quality financially, professionally and others.
More importantly, the official underscored the need for strengthening the society’s sense of belongingness to create a conducive education environment in the country through contributing their finance, ideas, and in-kind support, among others.
Meanwhile, recently in relation to the 28th Regular Session of the House of Peoples` Representatives, concerns regarding the education sector have been raised by parliamentarians and responses given by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.
Queries, such as the efforts made to ensure quality education, insufficient educational resources such as textbooks, laboratory chemicals, restoration of schools affected by the conflicts, making universities autonomous and the fate of low-income citizens who cannot pay the fees, as well as limitation in building the capacity of teachers that in turn become a problem to ensuring quality and other similar issues were raised.
While responding to queries, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said: “As it is stated in the roadmap, in the next four years, we will not expand universities; rather we strive to ensure quality. With the intention to automate the exams, for the last three or four years, extensive works have been carried out. Works have also been made to expand Kindergartens, primary, and secondary level schools, equally, efforts are made to expand school feeding programs as much as possible.”
Since bringing quality demands a lot of work, there are still several undone activities. Equipping schools with the required school materials such as books, and the Internet system and upgrading teachers’ capacity are the assignments that should be done. Though there are some encouraging progresses, we will continue to strengthen them, he added.
BY TEWODROS KASSA
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SUNDAY EDITION 9 JULY 2023
