Panorama actual El problema y sus consecuencias

The National Education System was introduced in 1983 and the first to be designed by the government after independence. Before 1975, Mozambique’s education system was comprised of missionary schools, public schools and private schools. The primary schools were divided in 1929 into ‘elementarias’ for the Portuguese and years of ‘rudimentarias’ – with simplified curriculum – for the indigenous (Newitt 1995: 440). The public schools,

located mostly in urban areas, were only available to the Portuguese and the ‘assimilados’.25 The main target of the ‘assimilação policy’ was to take indigenous people away from the influence of their own tradition (ibid). In turn, in the mission schools they were taught to live as ‘good Catholics’ and to be disciplined labourers. The missionary schools catered mainly for the ‘natives’, in the rural areas (Newitt, 1995). Since signing the 1940 Missionary Accord and Statue26 between Portugal and the Vatican, the Catholic Church became the principal provider of education in Mozambique (Sheldon, 1998). These agreements required the curriculum to be under the supervision of the colonial administration and fostered Portuguese nationalism (ibid). Thus until the 1960s the imported curriculum included texts referring to the history and geography of Portugal, alienating the students from their own surroundings in a process of cultural domination. The private schools (usually owned by the church) were only affordable for the well-off Portuguese.

As I learned during my fieldwork, many people considered that some of the characteristics of this very selective pre-independence education have changed in the post-independence education system. Nowadays, education in Mozambique is compulsory and free through to the age of 12 years. However, although the 2004/2005 reform abolished official school fees, an annual matriculation fee of approximately $5 is still charged (see for example, Handa et

al., 2004; Fox et al., 2012). Like in most African countries, entrance into successive higher

levels of schooling is based on national examinations (starting from 5th grade) (ibid).27 Schools and universities became mixed-sex institutions.

Today, the National Education System comprises of five sub-systems, namely General Education, Adult Education, Technical/Vocational Education, Teacher Training and Higher Education (MEC, 2010). The education system comprises two primary levels: lower and upper primary. Students who complete upper primary can go on to secondary school – EP1 (Ensino Primário do 1o Grau) (Primary Education 1st level – 1st-5th grade) and EP2 (Ensino Primário do 2o Grau) (Primary Education 2nd level – 6th-7th grade). There are various technical and vocational education and training opportunities for graduates of lower and upper primary, or lower secondary; 8th-10th grade (ESG1) (Ensino Secundário do 1o Ciclo) (Secondary Education 1st level) and 11th-12th grade (ESG2) (Ensino Secundário do 2o Ciclo) (Secondary                                                                                                                

25 _{Until 1961, indigenous Mozambican citizens could by adopting Portuguese language, culture and habits, become an}

‘assimilado’ and become a Portuguese citizen at the same time (Pitcher, 2002).

26 _{Acordo Missionario entre a Santa Se e a Republica Portuguesa}

42 Education 2nd level), which is the pre-university level; three levels of technical/vocational education – Elementary (1st_-3rd _{year), Arts and Crafts; basic (1}st_-3rd _{year), Commercial and} Industrial and Intermediate (1st_-3rd _{and 4}th _{year); and higher education (ibid).}

Difficulties in provision of education

Mozambique emerged from the civil war with a paralysed economy and a devastated material infrastructure, including its schools, roads, and health centres: “indeed, Renamo28 guerrillas overtly targeted these facilities for destruction” (Handa et al., 2004: 16). The ensuing civil war brought the darkest moments in the country’s history, devastating it throughout the 1980s and leading to the collapse of most of its newly-created buildings and infrastructure. As a resultant, Mozambican education has faced complex socio-economic problems. Provision of education therefore was restricted mainly to the cities in the southern part of the country. The number of EP1 schools (1st to 5th grade) was almost halved from 1983 to 1992 (UNDP, 2000).

Expansion and improvement in the education sector have been critical elements of the government’s long-term and short-term development strategies (UNESCO, 2002). Its Educational Strategic Sector Plan (ESSP) covers three areas of action: availability and quality of education; improvements and relevance of schooling; and the reinforcement of institutional capacity (MINED, 2001). Despite the expansion of the education system throughout the 1990s, the system continues to be inefficient, even given a genuine commitment to providing equitable access to education to all Mozambican children (UNDP, 2008). Lack of access to education, repetition and early drop-out are the consequences of this situation. Drop-out rates are high: 49.5 per cent of girls and 66 per cent of boys completed EP1 and only 28 per cent of girls and 40 per cent of boys graduated from EP2 in 2005 (MEC, 2006). The figures for completion of secondary school are much lower: just 4.5 per cent of girls and 9 per cent of boys complete ESG1, while less than one per cent of girls and two per cent of boys finished ESG2 (ibid).

28 _{A conservative political party led by Afonso Dhlakama. It fought against the Mozambican Liberation Front in the Civil}

Table 2.1 Education challenges

• The increase of students is not followed by improvement in the quality of education • There is a lack of classrooms and a significant number of children have no access

to school

• The combination of failure and drop-out rates (especially among girls) produces considerable wastage

• The student/teacher ratio continues to be high

• The increase in the number of untrained teachers (particularly in primary schools) and low numbers of female teachers

• The language of instruction is Portuguese, which the vast majority of children who start in grade one do not speak

• Low institutional capacity

• Cultural beliefs which afford little importance to schooling, in particular in rural areas

Source: Government of Mozambique, 2010.

As presented in the above table (Table 2.1) the quality of education is compromised by many constraints resulting in high repetition and drop-out rates. As I discuss in Chapter 7, teachers with poor general preparation, skills and professional training contribute to this situation. Among various socio-cultural reasons for high repetition and drop-out rates, Benson (2010) argues that the use of Portuguese for instruction is an important impediment to pupils’ understanding. An overwhelming number of Mozambican people are of Bantu extraction and are not fluent in Portuguese (Mário et al., 2006; VSO, 2011).29

The dominant ethno-linguistic groups in the research context – Sofala Province – are the Shona-speaking Ndau and Sena (Rosário et al., 2008). As I observed during my fieldwork, however, local languages are used less amongst people in urban areas. Whilst the situation in the city is rather complex because of migration from the rural areas to the city brings in a wide variety of languages, people choose to speak Portuguese in public spheres. Similarly, I noted that young people preferred to communicate in Portuguese in schools although many of them had problems speaking and understanding Portuguese (see Chapter 7). However, I did not observe any gender differences in language use. Moreover, it became apparent that the mother tongue is usually used in the private sphere, particularly in intergenerational communication. In the bairros (living quarters) and the city outskirts I often met children and youths speaking local languages; children who were too young to go to school or who did not receive formal education, spoke poor Portuguese or not at all.

29 _{From 1983 to 2003 Portuguese was the only functional language in the national curriculum. In 2003 Bantu languages}

44 Teacher training and teachers’ competence

The increase in the number of students at primary school has led to a shortage of both schools and qualified teachers. According to research conducted in the primary educational sector, the average number of primary school pupils per teacher is 64, and only 58 per cent of teachers in primary school have teacher training (VSO, 2008). The ratio of students per teacher in secondary school is 32 (ibid), and of a total of 1957 teachers in secondary schools, 1766 – almost 90 per cent – are qualified teachers. Teacher training for secondary school includes either nine years of formal schooling and two years at the Faculty of Education, or eleven years of schooling and two years’ teacher training in the disciplines they will teach. Teacher training for primary school was lately reduced to 10+1 – ten classes of primary education plus a year of teacher training. There are very few teachers with university education, and those with higher education usually teach in urban areas (VSO, 2008). In addition, in-training service and supervision are unavailable for the majority of teachers (ibid).

Poor quality of teacher training and very few opportunities for professional development affect teaching practice in classrooms. The teachers usually “talk at students and elicit rote responses” (Benson, 2004: 50). Benson notes that this is particularly persistent in Mozambican primary schools, where interaction is limited to ‘Entenderam? – Siiiiim!’ (Understood? – Yeees!) dialogue “that gives the appearance of understanding and interaction where there is neither” (ibid: 50). Adding to the situation, Portuguese as the only language of instruction (to the exclusions of the local languages) has created a serious barrier for most children in rural areas, where they enter school without knowing the language (MINED, 2001).

Since 1996 new curricula have been gradually introduced in Mozambican primary schools, and also since 2008 in secondary schools (VSO, 2008). The basic education and teacher training curricula have been revised and made more flexible and relevant to the actual needs of communities (MINED, 2001). The primary education curriculum has been organised into logical areas of knowledge comprising personal and social training components to promote ethics, a culture of peace, tolerance and unity, as well as better environmental attitudes, gender and cultural awareness (ibid). The new curricula are intended to be flexible enough to allow incorporation of contents determined by individual schools and teachers, and collaboration with local community interests (MINED, 2001). This complex transition is also affecting the teaching-learning process and students’ overall knowledge (VSO, 2008).

In this section I have examined the effect that the war has had on the infrastructure of the education system, particularly on schools in urban and rural areas of Mozambique. I have described some of the educational challenges faced by the system, for example with regards ethno-linguistically diverse learners: in post colonial Mozambique, Portuguese remains the language of instruction generating additional problems for students, and poorly qualified teachers. As I explore in Chapter 7, despite its democratic intentions the introduction of the new curriculum seems to have caused further difficulties for both teachers and students. This is due to the scarcity of resources in infrastructure, lack of teaching-learning materials and methodologies, and lack of professional support for teachers. On the whole, the quality of education is one of the important elements that can also affect girls’ education, which I discuss in the following section.