Group Flays Poor Implementation Of Early Child Education

The Civil Rights Con
cern, a non-governmental organisation, has bemoaned the poor implementation of the early child education in Anambra State.
In a communiqué at the end of its one-day workshop in Awka recently, the group noted that the early child development and education unit in the primary education section had remained underdeveloped and poorly staffed.
It said that after reviewing the provisions of the Universal Basic Education (UBE) Act in the state, it concluded that the teaching aid /instructional materials were lacking in the early child development unit.
It urged the state government to remedy the situation where pupils in primary schools did not have at least the text books in the core subjects such as mathematics, English, basic science and social studies.
The communiqué noted that the Anambra Universal Basic Education Commission had announced the availability of enough books in the store for distribution to the schools.
It added that teachers in primary schools were inadequate which made learning difficult even when the Parents/Teachers Association largely provided for their upkeep in some of the schools.
It said the schools were experiencing shortage of desks for the pupils and tables and chairs for the teachers in both primary and junior secondary sections.
The communiqué said that school fees were paid when the UBE Act provided for free education at that level, and parents who were unable to pay school fees/levies had dropped their children.
It urged the Anambra State Government to enumerate the content of free education to the citizens and determine how to progressively realise its full implementation.
It also appealed to the government to solve the problem of illegal levies paid by pupils and students even when the ASUBEB had issued warnings to punish schools indulging in the collection of levies.
It also called for the introduction of mid-day meals in the primary and junior secondary schools.