Aiding girl education

Where desks are a barrier

 

For Gift Mkandawire and Rose Kaunda, their participation in class should never be the same again. These St Mary’s Girls Primary School pupils in Karonga should now be able to do what they previously could not do.

Every school day, just like the many other pupils at their school, these girls spread themselves on the floor each time they entered a classroom in readiness for classes. And they remained like that until that day’s class session ended.

However, unlike their boy classmates, the girls struggled to participate in tackling questions their teacher would throw at the class in the course of a lesson. It is not that this withdrawal was a result of dullness.

While the boys would just spring up within seconds and attempt what the teacher asked, the girls would spend some more time to do so.

If the teacher pointed at one of them, she would sweep her dress tight to her body before fully standing up. Then she would attempt the question. And whether she gives a correct answer or not, she would also hold her dress tight to her body before gradually resuming her seat.

“It is a huge task for girls who sit on the floor to stand up and attempt a question posed in class in the course of a lesson,” says Joseph Nyondo, Desk Officer at the Karonga District Education Manager’s (Dem) office.

“They always have to do this so that they do not expose themselves to male class mates and teachers. And because of the nature of doing this so often, most of the girls have chosen not to participate in class exercises that would require them to stand. They sometimes feel shy.”

Nyondo says the development affects the girls’ quest to achieve their dreams as they lack opportunities to test their confidence in public. He adds that such cases would continue unless unavailability of desks in schools in the district is addressed.

If this unavailability of desks were a piece of cake for primary schools in each of the country’s districts to share, those in Karonga would certainly celebrate the most as they would get the biggest share.

Nyondo says the problem is so huge in the district that the population of desks goes into that of pupils 12 times. This means that if all pupils were to sit on desks, 12 pupils would cram one desk. Nyondo said there are about 159 primary schools in the district.

Unfortunately, each desk accommodates just two to three pupils. This means that for every desk allocated to a school, nine or 10 pupils will not feel it. And, unfortunately, it is the girl child that is pinched the most each time such a situation occurs.

The situation is evenly spread across the district such that there are schools that have existed for years without desks. One such school is Mubisi primary school which is so mired in such problems that the first consignment of desks since its inauguration in 1968 was a donation in December last year.

But while the situation remains for pupils in some schools in the district, those at St Mary’s Girls and Karonga CCAP Primary Schools should be singing a reasonably different story.

This change in fortunes for the girl children in the two schools is all because of the desks Standard Bank donated recently.

The donation was the coming to realisation of a promise made some time ago. Managing Director Charles Mudiwa promised when the bank inaugurated its Karonga branch in February last year that it would contribute K1million towards a school.

Communities were tasked to identify the beneficiary school, and they identified St Mary’s Girls and Karonga CCAP Primary Schools.

“Basic education, particularly for the girl child, and maternal health are quite so dear to Standard Bank that we will try our best and render our assistance in those areas,” says the bank’s Head of Corporate Banking Issa Edward.

“We reckon that it is one of the ways we would like to move Malawi forward. As a bank, we are operating in a society and not a vacuum. It is in this society that customers and future employees for the bank live and will come from.”

Edward said overall, the bank has dedicated one percent of its after tax annual profit towards social responsibility drives. He, however, said while the bank has a number of areas to spend this allocation on, the girl child education and maternal health are priorities.

He added that the donation of the desks was one of the bank’s contributions to girl child education. But it is not the only one. He said Mulunguzi secondary school benefitted through the renovation of some girls hostels.

The bank has also spent K14million to paint Chintheche rural hospital in Nkhata Bay and stock it with two brand new oxygen concentrators, a computer, a refrigerator and additional beds and mattresses. It also set up a telephone system at the refurbished facility besides installing two electric cooking pots.

But while the gesture at Chintheche has no direct benefit to the girl child, that of desks has. Gift and Rose will now stand without difficulties and attempt the questions. This should allow them to test their confidence in public and evenly participate in class.