Behind students’ failure to join secondary schools

Salum Musa (left), a student who was selected to join Mnazi Mmoja Secondary School, buys exercise books at Karume Market in Dar es Salaam. Hundreds of students are reported to have failed to join Form One over various reasons. PHOTO | FILE

Dar es Salaam. Thousands of Form One students who have been selected to join various secondary schools across the county are yet to report to their respective schools due to various reasons, The Citizen can report.

Among other reasons is failure by parents to of students coming from low-income families to pay for school contributions which have been introduced by the schools’ administrations.

The majority of these parents are peasant farmers growing cashew nuts, cotton and tobacco who sold their crops but are yet to be paid.

Survey by The Citizen in various areas show parents are forced to dig deep into their pockets to pay school contributions despite the free education policy, Some schools have introduced contributions which are paid to science subject teachers as motivation and used to buy food and other expenditures.

In Serengeti District, about 2,400 students out of selected 5250 have not joined secondary schools due to poverty.

Reports from Arusha Region say only 89 students out of the selected 169 have joined secondary schools.

A similar situation is reported in Morogoro Region where only 28,970 students out of selected 39,879 have reported to secondary schools.

In Dodoma Region, only 6,037 students out of selected 8,886 have reported to the secondary schools while in Tabora Region only 12,832 students out of the selected 30,867 had reported to the secondary schools by January 17.

A resident of Matare Mr Gabriel Mwita told The Citizen he was required to pay Sh800, 000 in contributions requested by the school.

“The contributions are very high as I was instructed to buy 72 kg of maize, 30 kg of beans, 25 kg of rice, 5 kg of sugar and other non-food items such as school uniforms and books,” complained Mr Mwita.

Ms Josephine Eliya who is an entrepreneur, told The Citizen that she has failed to take her child to school due to poverty.

Mr Paul Singija, from Shinyanga Region said: “I was told to pay Sh25, 000 contributions for uniforms. My income per day is Sh2, 000. Therefore, I have failed to take my child to school.”

Mr Ibrahim Kahenga from Igwisi Village in Kaliua District, Tabora Region told The Citizen that the villagers were yet to secure buyers for their raw tobacco products, the situation that has made them fail to pay for the required school contributions.