Martin Endjala
The designing and implementation of a provision of school grant policy will do much for the realisation of two of the goals of education, equity and equality.
Hofni Iipinge, the Central Committee and Politburo Swapo Party Member and Deputy Secretary of Education Arts and Sport at the party level, welcomed the decision to approve the School Grant Policy by Cabinet, citing it as a very positive move.
Iipinge said that in the past, the provision of equal resources to state schools has been inappropriate, considering that schools in rural and remote areas face more pressing challenges than schools based in urban areas.
He pointed out that some schools are not connected to electricity or the internet because they are located in marginalised areas and because of that, face more complicated challenges. Such schools are also dealing with the mind transformation and civilisation of the marginalised people, he said.
Iipinge said he believes that the school grant provision will assist in developing schools that are lagging behind in terms of the developments such as information and communication technology.
He added that the grants will assist in the provision of learning and teaching materials for poor-performing schools.
Iipinge is of the opinion that school grants will boost the morale of teachers and learners that attend poor-performing and disadvantaged schools that mostly rely on donations and sponsorships.
He is convinced that the decision undertaken by Cabinet is a demonstration of the government’s commitment to realising the dream of ensuring that all children have access to adequate resources in the pursuit of their education, whilst also ensuring that no one is left behind.
Iipinge’s reaction follows a proposed grant funding formula for the school grant policy that was submitted to Cabinet by the Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture and was approved at the tenth Cabinet Decision-making meeting held earlier this month.
Cabinet approved the actual breakdown of the proposed funding formula school grant policy to reduce existing inequalities through an efficient and equitable funding mechanism to ensure that schools and their learners from different socio-economic backgrounds have access to adequate resources to participate fully in education.
Cabinet also approved the integrated physical education and school sports policy, to develop and implement inclusive programmes which would result in increased and improved participation to address all forms of exclusion from physical education and physical activities and sports.
