CONTINUOUS POOR GRADE 12 RESULTS IN NORTHWESTERN PROVINCE WORRY PROTUZ
Professional Teachers Union of Zambia (PROTUZ) Deputy Director in North-Western Province, Gilly Kakunta, has expressed concern that the continuous poor grade 12 examination results in the province has a negative effect on the number of children from the region entering into Universities and colleges in the Country.
Speaking when he featured on the programme dubbed “the Citizen” on ZANIS TV, Mr Kakunta noted that the grade 12 examination results determine how many children would be sent to universities and other higher learning institutions.
Mr Kakunta observed that the poor performance of children at grade 12 in North-Western, means that the province will not be productive as it will lack human resource even to contribute to national development.
” The results for pupils at grade 12 determine how many children we will be sending to tertiary institutions like colleges as well as Universities, so if the province produces very few learners with good results it means we are sending very few again into those higher learning institutions.
“At the end of it all they will be very few graduates from the universities and colleges and in the end, the province as well as the country may not be progressive,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mr Kakunta, however, stated that there has been a slight improvement in this year’s results as compared to last year where the province recorded 45% and was the last province as compared to this year where it has recorded 47.03% and got a 9th position out of the ten provinces.
” This slight improvement is a plus to the province, meaning that if we continue performing this way, come 2024/2025 we may be somewhere number five or four in the country.
“As a Union we noted this poor performance way back in 2022 and something was being done to correct the situation,” he noted.
And Mr Kakunta attributed the poor performance of pupils at grade 12 to few school infrastructure across the province.
He said because of a lack of school infrastructure, many learners are forced to be handled by a few teachers which compromises teaching and learning.
He observed that from 1964 to date, the previous governments had not done much for the province in as far as construction of school infrastructure is concerned.
” Three past Governments didn’t do much for the Province, we have very few secondary schools. These secondary schools you see now were previously primary schools with the number of class rooms without laboratories,” he said.
Mr Kalumbila has since expressed hope that under the United Party for National Development (UPND), school infrastructure in North-Western Province will be improved especially with the increased Constituency Development Fund (CDF).