Minister of Education, Arts and Culture, Anna Nghipondoka has urged teachers to continue following the regulations that are in place to help curb the spread of Coronavirus (COVID-19) as teachers continue to contract the virus.

Nghipondoka made the call here on Monday during a consultative meeting on the implementation of the advanced subsidiary level curriculum in the ||Kharas Region.

“A teacher is a key person in the development of this country. We are losing teachers. Losing more than 10 teachers is very painful. Let us keep safe, let us treat everyone we meet like it is a suspected COVID-19 case,” she urged.

Nghipondoka said there is a misconception that learners are the ones bringing the virus to schools, which she disagrees with.

‘I don’t agree at all. Not after I have visited all the schools and saw the carefulness at these schools. It is rather the teachers contracting the virus from their community. If you go into the community, into the shops you will see no one is wearing a mask, these are the places that teachers are getting the virus from. It is now not the time to go and party, it is time to go to work and come back home and lock yourself inside your houses,” she stressed.

Further Nghipondoka urged teachers to do all they can to make the first Advance Subsidiary (AS) class of 2021 a trailblazer in terms of ensuring progress to universities to encourage more learners from grade 11 to work hard to progress to the AS level.

“Whatever we achieve will be setting either a positive or negative trend. It will either motivate or demotivate and it can give confidence to the community at large about our education system and efforts to improve it,” she noted.

Speaking at the same occasion, ||Kharas Governor, Aletha Frederick raised concern about the number of learners from her region admitted in various institutions of higher education, noting that the number remains low.

“I have observed that access to higher education seems to be our biggest challenge, particularly for the young people of this region, especially if we look at the learner regional representation in terms of the student population at most of the institutions in the region. We need to redouble our efforts to ensure that our learners are prepared in terms of performance to access tertiary education in the region. As stakeholders in education, we are duty-bound to provide our learners with all the necessary support and inspiration to pursue their dreams,” said Frederick.

Source: Namibia Press Agency