By Umaru Fofana
Mbalu, not her real name, applied to enter university to study Mass Communication. Like hundreds of others do year-on-year, she had treated it as a gamble, in the hope she would be able to raise her fees somehow – through friends and other good Samaritans.
With the introduction of free education last year, which removed fees for pupils in primary and secondary schools, President Julius Maada Bio announced a raft of other freebies in the education sector. Mbalu did not know she would not need to worry for her fees after all. Her father had taught in a public school for 11 years. Because of that, she easily became eligible to get a university education free. She easily got verified as her father’s daughter, and could not believe her “luck”, as she called it. She is preparing for second year. So anyone who has taught for ten years now has the opportunity to have a maximum of three of their children to enter university and get an education for free. No doubt it is a policy that is open to abuse considering how some human beings, especially in this part of the world, behave. I wouldn’t be surprised if some people resorted to using that as a means of making money by looking for people with a common surname to get placement for them in university. And a DNA test is not only expensive and time-consuming, but introducing that could lead to its own attendant problems for some homes.
My friend was saved a stress which had been dangling over his head ever since his nephew said he wanted to study engineering. His gut reaction was to tell the nephew that he could not afford the fees while he had other responsibilities to contend with. He managed to buy an application form for his nephew, Patrick, to apply in the hope miracle would happen. In the end, Patrick was reimbursed the application fee money as part of a new government policy.
Not only that, a new government policy was also announced that all those going to study the sciences, technology, engineering, mathematics, and later agriculture, would be doing so without paying a dime. He is still celebrating, one year later as his nephew goes to second year.
When the free education initiative was announced, there was a lot of scepticism around its takeoff. The figures are still being analysed but safe to say that the policy implementation was accompanied by a huge turnout of children in school. Heads of schools complained that they were overwhelmed. While I wait for the dropout rate from that number – there is bound to be that – it is safe to say that an unprecedented number of children are now in school. Apparently to address the expectedly high numbers of children that would enrol, an announcement was made for free-tuition in teacher training colleges. Teething problems such as inadequate classroom space and some learning materials remain, but a great initiative and start. As a country, our money is going where our mouth is.
It is hair-raising to see kids inside the new school buses on their way to and from class. While there are doubts as to their sustainability, not least those plying tough terrains in the countryside, it is a remarkable move that the local councils have been given the buses to run. A central government control has not been introduced over them, which would have ineluctably brought the two on a collision course, in a country with a tetchy if not toxic political atmosphere.
If all of this is sustained and improved upon, give Sierra Leone a few more years to appreciate the impact of these interventions in the education sector on the country’s growth. Obviously the curricula need to be revised. Lesson notes need to be upgraded. Emphasis is needed on technical and vocational education to address the middle manpower. Not everyone can or even desires to go to university. The profile of tech-voc learning should be upped. President Julius Maada Bio should seriously consider a blueprint for that sector which should be announced or even rolled out at a graduation ceremony of a tech-voc institute – say Murialdo in Lunsar – which he should attend.
Education is the present and the future of any nation. The fact is that our manpower is lamentably weak due to the level of education in a country where, ironically, Western education started in Africa south of the Sahara. Annie Walsh: first girls’ high school in black Africa; Sierra Leone Grammar School: first boys’ high school in West Africa; Fourah Bay College: first western-style university in black Africa. You begin to wonder and lament how, where and why we went so badly wrong!
All of the expected dividends from the education initiatives of President Bio, remind me of the introduction in 2011 of the free health care system for pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers and children under five years old. That policy by President Ernest Bai Koroma led to a surge in the number of women and children that visited our health facilities. There obviously were and remain challenges confronting the scheme but the fact remains that many pregnant women who would have stayed at home and died for lack of a user fee have been and are still being saved. The same can be said of those under-five children who would have otherwise died. We do not know the impact in terms of how this has or will eventually reduce the maternal and infant mortality and morbidity numbers but it is obvious it has served as a disincentive for quacks wreaking havoc – at least their numbers have reduced.
Health and education are two of the key pillars in the development of the human capital. Whatever challenges may be besetting these two initiatives, we must all as a nation wish for them to succeed. After all our children or wives or other relatives benefit from them. The growth of Singapore started with a sound education system. We may be a long way away, but these baby steps will become giant walks sooner or later. That is why I strongly believe that the future of Sierra Leone is bright, very bright!
© 2019 Politico Online
