500 enrol in adult literacy course

Pace for Social Change has enrolled 500 adults in literacy lessons in Mzuzu.

In an interview, the organisation’s project officer Edmond Chiumia said they wanted to equip adults with numerical and literacy skills to effectively monitor their children’s school work.

He said they discovered that most children whose parents are illiterate were not involved academically during the six months school break induced by the Covid-19 pandemic last year.

“With the adult literacy programme, we expect parents to assist their children with school work to make up for time  lost last year,” said Chiumia.

One of the learners, Edna Kayuni, 55, said besides helping her children with school work, reading and writing skills are critical in everyday life.

“Some of us are running small-scale businesses and we need numerical and literacy skills to manage the businesses effectively,” she said.

The programme is a continuation of the initiative the organisation conducted in response to Covid-19 when it provided fast-tracked teaching and learning guides in primary schools to enable pupils catch up with academic work not done during the school break.