13 000 drop out of school in 2013 alone!

Last week the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education released a report with which had disturbing figure of school drop outs in 2013 Zimbabwe. While the official figure of 13000 may be lower than the “actual” figures it is quite disheartening to note the major reasons and the gender of those dropping out. Below are some of the disturbing facts;

1. More than 13 000 primary and secondary school pupils dropped out of school in 2013 owing to early marriages and lack of school fees,
2. About 52 percent of secondary school drop-outs were females, and 40 percent of all primary school pupils who failed to proceed with their education were also females.

3. At secondary level 2 289 dropped out of school comprising 1 063 females and 1 226 males because of school fees, while 1 191 failed to continue because of marriages, with 801 of them being females and 390 males. Absconded has 901, while pregnancy has a total of 856 drop-outs.

4. At primary level, 2 784 dropped out because of school fees consisting of 1 646 males and 1 138 females followed by absconded, which consists of 591 males and 440 females. Death and unknown reasons have 525 and 625 respectively
5. Only157 in every 1 000 pupils successfully progress from Form 1 to Upper 6, which is down from 168 calculated from 2012. The increased number of school drop-outs comes as the ministry is grappling with a huge number of children failing to access the Basic Education Assistance Module (BEAM) [a government initiative meant to assist poor children with school fees] in the payment of fees.
6. There are over one million orphaned and vulnerable children in Zimbabwe in need of assistance.

Children who are supposed to be in school: Image courtesy of speechlog.com

This is the reason why we at Tariro exert ourselves to educate orphaned and vulnerable girls. We believe our ‘small’, yet tangible steps are a vital cog in the wheel of social change. Our range of services are meant to be the much needed cushion to the worn out social safety net.