Focus on the plight of teachers

Low wages, heavy workloads, disrespect amongst the social strata of Tanzania and HIV/AIDS have helped to diminish what was once a reputable profession, glorified at one time by former President Julius Nyerere and his use of the Kiswahili word, mwalimu, or teacher, as his title. The country's literacy rate for males 15 to 20 years of age stands at 93.8 percent and 89.4 percent for females, according to UNESCO's (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation’s) Montreal-based Institute for Statistics. www.uis.unesco.org Hakielimu, a local NGO specialising in education and related issues, released a report on 25 February illustrating the various factors eroding the teaching profession's credibility within the Tanzanian educational system, calling on the government to boost it's structure. The NGO believes there are a large number of interrelated reasons that contribute to the substandard quality of education in Tanzania. According to the report, some of these problems are partly related to the absence of appropriate textbooks and other teaching materials, the limited time spent on task by teachers and students, as well as the level of poverty among parents, which affects the nutritional and general health status of their children. Tanzania launched its Primary Education Development Programme (PEDP) in 2001, which aims at improving access to education and raising its quality. However, the issue of access to education appears to have been solved and it is expected by 2006, all school-age children will be enrolled in primary schools. The programme also notes the need for continuous professional development of teachers. The report points out that although efforts are underway to improve teachers' professional knowledge and skills, far less attention is focussed on their material welfare. "Many teachers have minimal material or intellectual support and their salary is often insufficient to maintain them and their families," Hakielimu said in the report. "Teachers' social environment, attitudes, and working conditions are interrelated in a complex way that needs to be understood better if efforts to improve education in this country are to succeed," the reported continued. Low Salaries The 50-page report documents several problems affecting teachers in primary and secondary schools in Tanzania, where low salaries seems to be most prevalent. Most teachers lead a miserable life and, to make ends meet, some are forced to engage in additional activities such as selling buns, ice cream and, in urban centres, conducting evening classes, commonly known as tuition. "Teachers spend more time looking for money to make ends meet," Georgia Ruyobya, a Dar es Salaam resident, said. "I am forced to hire a teacher to come to my home in the evening to give tuition to my children so that the kids can cover up for what they missed in school. "In many cases, children who attend special tuition perform better," Joyce Ngoile, another parent, added. A messenger, with a secondary school education, in a privately-owned commercial bank, for example, can earn around 300,000 shillings (about US $300), while a clerk could earn as much as 600,000 shillings ($600), far more than a primary school teacher. "In other professions, like accountants, bankers, medical doctors and lawyers, graduates earn up to four digits in dollars [above 1,000] but not teachers," Ted Mhagama, a senior official in the Ministry of Education, said. A primary school teacher gets less than 80,000 Tanzanian shillings (about $80) a month, while the secondary school counterpart gets around 150,000 shillings (about $150). In most municipalities a five-member family will need 20,000 to 30,000 shillings (about $20 to $30) monthly rent for decent accommodation and at least 150,000 shillings (about $150) monthly for at least two meals a day, and fuel. "This is apart from commuter bus fare where a worker needs between 2,000 and 4,000 shillings ($2 and $4) every week, depending on the distance from home and place of work," Tabia Denis, a primary school teacher, told IRIN. In a community where a person is respected for his wealth, teachers have little to offer and be admired of. "I will allow my son or daughter to opt for teaching as a matter of last resort," says a secondary-school teacher in Dar es Salaam, who asked not to be identified. The report is based on a study conducted over the last two years, covering seven districts in seven of 26 regions in the country, which were picked at random from seven educational zones. A total of 35 secondary schools and 74 primary-school teachers were personally interviewed, while over 1,000 others responded to questionnaires. Working conditions and lack of respect Hakielimu points out that difficult working conditions for teachers seriously undermines learning achievements in many schools, calling for the government's intervention to increase the delivery of educational services, one of the priority areas in the country's poverty-reduction agenda. Some teachers in rural areas are forced to live in second-rate homes due to lack of quarters near schools. It is due to the efforts of Prime Minister Frederick Sumaye - who, over the last nine years, closely supervised a campaign for construction of more classrooms, teachers' housing quarters and other facilities to boost the country education sector - that things have improved in some areas. Adding to the complexity of the problems, admiration seems hard to come by for teachers, as their profession has run into an esteem problem. "Pupils, parents or community members do not respect teachers," the report quotes a Dar es Salaam-based, Grade A-female teacher as saying. "I will ask my son/daughter to become teachers only if they cannot find other employment." Other respondents said that they landed in teaching because they lacked other career opportunities. One male secondary-school teacher in northern Tanzania's Mwanza region said he had become a teacher after not being accepted into medical school. He reported being satisfied with his career choice early on, but then said he could not meet the financial demands of raising a family on teacher's wages. "Teachers are not respected by anyone," another teacher said. "I once advised some students to opt for teaching and they all burst into laughter. Students see [the] conditions we live in and the kind of life we have - they do not want to become like us." Absenteeism and the Impact of HIV/AIDS Teachers in rural areas often abandon classes and travel to district headquarters to collect salaries. Sometimes they wait up to four days for checks to be distributed. HIV/AIDS is also a major cause of absenteeism and has affected the provision of education in various ways. First, experienced teachers are dying in droves. Tanzania's Education Minister Joseph Mungai recently announced that more than 140,000 teachers had died of AIDS-related diseases in the past two decades. He said the virus had claimed 121,548 primary-school teachers and 18,747 secondary-school teachers in the past 20 years, averaging 7,014 teachers per annum. This attrition and absenteeism due to illness has increased workloads on the other teachers. "I am teaching Kiswahili and mathematics and I have 16 periods a week," a female, Grade A teacher in Ludewa urban district said. "In the classes that I teach, there are between 120 and 150 pupils. This is a very unsatisfactory situation." Another problem with such large class sizes is that some pupils, especially those sitting at the back, do not listen and, as a result, fail to learn. To stave off HIV/AIDS and other associated problems, Mungai said anti-retroviral drugs and condoms should be made available to teachers in remote areas so that they could stay alive and continue teaching longer. In nearly every school in Tanzania, there are AIDS orphans. Teachers are expected to treat these children with understanding and compassion. Yet most lack the skills to care for children traumatised after losing one or both parents.