Book crisis hits public schools
Shortage of textbooks has hit most public learning institutions, a situation Civil Society Education Coalition (Csec) says is affecting education standards in the country.
In an interview after the handover of 1 015 textbooks to Malawi University of Business and Applied Sciences (Mubas) in Blantyre, Csec board chairperson Limbani Nsapato noted that shortage of textbooks is a big problem in the country’s public schools.
He noted that an average of about 15 students in most public primary, secondary and tertiary learning institutions scramble for one textbook.
Said Nsapato: “Access to books in national learning institutions is really one of the biggest challenges. You would find that so many students are using one book, which makes learning and teaching difficult. This affects students’ performance in their respective education journey.”
He said Mubas was one of the many public learning institutions experiencing challenges due to shortage of textbooks; hence, the donation of K135 million worth of books.
In a separate interview, Mubas Vice-Chancellor Associate Professor Nancy Chitera acknowledged that her institution faces numerous challenges bordering on access to textbooks.
She said the Mubas library accommodates about 600 students against a student population of about 13 000, making it difficult for many to access textbooks for their respective studies.
“Yes we are buying [textbooks], but looking at the rate that we are growing, we need more books.
“Therefore, the coming in of this particular donation, for us it serves as a quite great deal because we know that most of our students now will have access to such kinds of books,” said Chitera.
In 2017, the German Government gave the Ministry of Education about 7.4 million primary school textbooks then valued at K4 billion to help improve the quality of education in the country.
