Online Reporter
Ronald Takudzwa Sambona
(Youth advocate and educator)
Education in our country largely resembles the Biblical talent that was buried in the land.
We have education, but do we use it?
Am I educated if my brother or sister is bound by hopeless ignorance and poverty?
Education for us should be more than the right to pursue our own self-interest and knowledge.
Our open minds and immense knowledge about the world should be translated into a deeper care and empathy for others’ well-being. There’s much more to education than life as we know it. All liberal Constitutions around the world highlight the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as central ideals to any healthy and functioning democracy.
But beyond that, we realise that these unalienable rights cannot be fully enjoyed without education.
These rights and other rights are brought to life by education, and it is only through education that nations safeguard life, liberty, and happiness. Education is the beginning and end of life. It safeguards everything that we hold dear. All rights, privileges, and benefits we enjoy today are the outcomes of education.
There is definitely much more to education than life. Aside from viewing education as a matter of rights, imagine it as the experiences of life you create for those around you.
Being educated is not just about ourselves, but about how we make the world around us feel.
Is the world any better or worse because of us? I come from rural areas, and can confidently say that education has played a larger role in my personal journey than anything else in my life.
The experiences that I have lived through in pursuit of my own education are far richer than life itself.
We must realise the urgency of bringing life, liberty, and happiness to our young people, especially in the rural areas, by giving them the greatest gift ever – education. Our commitment to other areas of life should not overshadow the need for us to put education at the forefront.
John Dewey noted it best that education is not a preparation for life, but it is life itself.
There’s much more to education, even when life seems to prove otherwise.
As learners navigate their lives, they must weigh the two and realise that they don’t have to choose at all.
Ultimately, education and life are connected, and you can still live your life while pursuing your education.
Most of the time, some learners, alongside parents, feel they must cut one off, or it won’t work.
This type of thinking holds us back. It is in appreciating that all good things we want out of life and currently enjoy in life are the results of education, that we make the right decision.
The right decision is always to choose education, for choosing education is choosing life!
Just as the independence flame, we lit in 1980 still burns today, we must prevent the education flame from dying down.
Studies conducted by the UNICEF in 2023 indicate that the net enrolment rate for secondary schools in Zimbabwe is almost half that of the primary schools, sitting at 49 per cent for the former. A World Bank research in 2022 revealed that the gross tertiary enrolment rate in Zimbabwe was 8 per cent at the time. Since dropout rates have surged in the country due to a lot of challenges in the education sector, it’s rational to say that these numbers are even lower today.
Taking this into consideration, we must then institute policies and measures to address the underlying challenges that are depriving our young people of their right to education. Learning does not happen on the educators’ terms, but on the learners’ terms. The Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education in 2022 stated that only 1 in 4 schools had access to computers and that a mere 47 per cent of rural schools in Zimbabwe had access to electricity. Part of making education appealing to our young people is to create mobile learning environments that stimulate their interests, support their passions, and align with the digital age. In the information civilisation, digital skills are paramount and digitising education is key to capturing our young people. Our learners in rural areas must love going to school because it’s fun and relevant to do so, and because they learn new skills applicable in the digital era.
Ultimately, because education is more important than anything in life, we must work to ensure that every citizen has access to it easily and affordably and at a quality that is relevant for the digital era. Since there’s much more to education than life, we must deliberately seek knowledge every time without surrendering this sacred right to the pleasures of life. Zimbabwe rises as one. Only when our forgotten areas and people are made a part of the education vision can we truly rise.
