School Enrolment Reaches 1.3 Million Despite Conflict In S. Sudan The number of pupils enrolled in primary and secondary schools across the country has reached 1.3 million despite the on-going conflict that has led to closure of many schools, officials of the Ministry of General Education said on Wednesday. 22 June 2017 School Enrolment Reaches 1.3 Million Despite Conflict In S. Sudan Primary school children dancing during a past event [File photo]
By Jale Richard JUBA, 22 June 2017 [Gurtong]-“The appetite for education in South Sudan remains undimmed despite conflict, hunger, displacement and economic crisis as the data on the Schools Attendance Monitoring System (SAMS) shows,” said the Undersecretary Michale Lopuke Lotyam. He noted that despite escalation of conflict in 2016, SAMS is only reporting data from 2,855-half of the schools which State actors have access to and where mobile network coverage is available. “The number of pupils with data uploaded to SAMS…is rising faster than in any previous year and is set to surpass the record set in 2016 of 1.3 million enrolled in 3,560 schools.” Lopuke said. The ratio of boys to girls is also record high, as 44.4% of the enrolled pupils are girls, compared to 43% in the previous year, SAMS data revealed. The Ministry attributes the increase in girls’ enrollment to the GESS program that transfers cash to keep the girls in schools. Lopuke said that the enrolment has been made possible through the support of partners such as Girls Education South Sudan (GESS), UNICEF, UK aid, and other partners. He said the school enrollment and attendance is being tracked by school attendance monitoring system (SAMS), a system developed as part of Gess program. According to Education Management Information System, there are 5,700schools in the country. The 2,850 schools covered is just over half of the number of schools covered this year due to inaccessibility. Lopuke says the schools, pupils and teachers should be proud of the achievement. “The ministry of General Education recognizes that there is much work to be done to make sure that every child in South Sudan goes to school, and we remain steadfast in our commitment to reaching that goal,” he said. Despite the record high enrolment, there are over 2 million children out of school, Lopuke said the displacement of communities in Greater upper Nile, Equatoria regions, the number of children out-of-school is more than 2 million. Posted in: Home, Education -- To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/d/forum/southsudankob View this message at https://groups.google.com/d/msg/southsudankob/topic-id/message-id For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "South Sudan Info - The Kob" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/SouthSudanKob. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/SouthSudanKob/CAJb14orv1k17mcjvw0sQQ5nwjPfYyybwKwTR5VCtTLLHV3OxKg%40mail.gmail.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
