EDITORIAL : School dropout rate a cause for concern

The rate at which pupils are dropping out of school, particularly in rural areas, is a source of national concern. It is now estimated that about half of enrolled pupils drop out before completing primary education.

This is despite the introduction of free primary education four decades ago. The authorities cite early marriages and ignorance of the value of education as some of the major reasons young people abandon school in their thousands every year.

In the past five years in Kasulu District, for instance, almost half of the pupils who entered Standard One did not make it to Standard Seven. This is not only sad, but also very alarming.

Only 10,305 pupils completed primary school in 2010 out of the 20,608 children enrolled in 2004. On the whole, the average pass mark in the district that year was a dismal 43 per cent.

The situation is not any better in the supposedly more affluent urban areas.

Poverty appears to drive many young girls out of school to work as house helps or barmaids or engage in prostitution.

The boys also leave school to work in mines or do other menial jobs for which they earn peanuts. This cannot be left to continue. 

Efforts must be made now to reverse the situation. One way of doing this is for the government to take action against parents or guardians of school dropouts who get married or take up odd jobs.

Village governments should ensure that stern action is taken against those who block children from joining Form One even after they pass their Standard Seven examination well.

What is needed is firm action, not empty rhetoric and threats that cannot change anything.

The school dropout scourge must be curbed if we are to lay a foundation for the skilled manpower the country badly needs.