Online Reporter
Farirai Machivenyika
Senior Reporter
THE Government should prioritise the employment of qualified teachers to ensure the successful implementation of the heritage-based Curriculum 5.0, the acting chairperson of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Primary and Secondary Education, Cde Ophias Murambiwa, has said.
Cde Murambiwa said this during an interactive workshop organised by the Zimbabwe Teachers Association under the Go Public: Fund Education campaign, held under the theme, ‘Strengthening Public Education Financing Through Evidence-Based Dialogue’ in Harare on Tuesday.
His call came amid indications that there is a shortage of 50 000 teachers in the country.
“The new heritage-based curriculum 5.0 requires qualified teachers, especially for STEM subjects, which makes it critical that we employ more qualified teachers and also reduce the teacher-to-pupil ratio,” he said.
Zimta chief executive officer, Dr Sifiso Ndlovu, said there was need for Government to increase funding for education in line with the Incheon Declaration, which provides for education funding to be between 4-6 percent of GDP.
“Give us the money for Zimbabwe’s education we want. We should improve our budget processes by looking at the ratio of allocation to GDP,” Dr Ndlovu said.
Zimta appreciated that the funding of the education sector was predominantly from domestic resources through Treasury and School Development Associations.
“One thing we should be proud of is that our education is domestically financed through SDC’s and Treasury, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need assistance; we could do with some help,” he said.
“Let Zimbabwe become known not only for prioritising education in principle, but for financing it in practice,” he said.
