90 PRIMARY KIDS PREGNANT

ANDREW MUKOMA writes@SunZambianEARLY pregnancies have rocked Sinazongwe District of Southern Province, especially among school-going children.The increase in the number of early pregnancies and early marriages has raised concerns among stakeholders and in particular education authorities.Munzuma Primary School Head teacher, Doubt Nchimunya, said that early marriages and pregnancies had resulted in high numbers of school drop outs and requires urgent attention from all stakeholders.Mr Nchimunya said that out of 250 learners at Munzuma Primary School, only about 90 were girls with many others dropping out of school due to early pregnancies and early marriages.He said that school drop out at the facility was very high, attributing it to culture and beliefs imposed by their parents.Mr Nchimunya was speaking in an interview with the in Munzuma at the weekend,“The girls are married off at a very tender age and parents prefer marrying off their daughters than taking them to school. This trend is worrying,” he said.The head teacher said that in some instances, some girls were married off as soon as they reached Grade Six and below the age of 15 years old.The school runs from grade one to seven and it has about 250 pupils and five government teachers.The head teacher bemoaned lack of infrastructure at the school which he said needs urgent attention from the government.Mr Nchimunya said the school has only one by two classroom block to carte for the classes starting grade one up to seven.“What is happening at this school is that teachers are doing multi-grade teaching where we combine some grades so that they can fit in the classes.“Classes like grade five and six are combined. A teacher is teaching two classes at the same time and handle different topics,” he explained.He added that this had not been an easy undertaking because teachers were over stretched as they had more work to do.“In short, teacher pupil ratio is the biggest challenge though we are managing within our means,” he added. The Sun