Teachers

Prime Minister Peter O’Neill has confirmed that the first lot of teachers have already arrived.

O’Neill made the announcement after being questioned by East Sepik Governor Allan Bird about the drop in the quality of education in the country.

The PM said maths and science are lacking in the number of teachers that are graduating out of colleges.

He stated the fault partly lies with Goroka Teachers College being converted into a university and not focusing on its role as teacher training institution.

Students will commence classes a week later on Monday, January 29.

Education Secretary, Dr Uke Kombra, says once the teachers resume duties, they will be required to report to their principal, head teacher or manager to confirm that they have been posted to the school by the National Education Board or the Provincial Education Board.

Dr Kombra urges all teachers and new graduates to remember to complete the Resumption of Duty Summary Sheet or RODSS, and Teacher Record of Appointment and other relevant documents.

Charlie is the principal of Ted Diro Primary, one of NCD’s best performing school.

Sadly, this year, the school saw only half of its grade 8 students making it through to grade 9.

Charlie says this was not the case in previous years.

And while she blames this on teacher absenteeism and the development of students from stage to stage, she adds that many students this year were average and below average.

The poor grades, she says is because of lack of concentration by students.

Minister for Education Nick Kuman, when celebrating with teachers during the World Teachers Day on Oct 5 in Port Moresby, said teachers are the real nation builders.  

“Teachers are the ones who educate the youth of society who, in turn, become the leaders of the next generation of people and play an important role in developing their country.

“Teachers educate the children in their most impressionable years.

For teachers on Bipi Island in Manus, they wait till the fourth fortnight to make that trip to Lorengau, simply because one fortnight pay cannot meet the travel cost.

Ms Mary Peter is a Grade Four teacher at the primary school on the island. To get to Lorengau, she travels on 40 horse powered motor on banana boats, a trip that takes up to 5 hours one way.  

“It’s very expensive, about K600 we must save to travel using 20 gallon zoom one way. We usually wait three fortnights and on the fourth fortnight, we go to town.

This directly affects a child’s education when teachers are faced with this issue.

Joseph Kolowa, deputy principal of Lealea Primary School, in the nation’s capital, highlighted this as one immediate need of the school serving children in the surrounding villages.

He says at the moment, there are 14 teachers but only 12 houses. And these available houses are in very poor condition.

“We are very desperate because families are in danger. Some teachers have taken it on board to do maintenance themselves.

The notice has been given through the Secretary’s Circular Instruction No 8 of 2017.

While commending the teachers and students who resumed Term 3 on Monday, July 10, Secretary for Education, Dr Uke Kombra, said it is very important that all students attending schools within the National Education System meet the approved instructional hours to be eligible for graduation and to sit for the Grade 8, Grade 10 and Grade 12 examinations.

Therefore teachers must be at the schools and must perform their teaching and other curricular duties.

According to TSC chairman Baran Sori, this is because approved teacher training institutions are not graduating enough teachers to be allocated to all the schools in the country.

“Similarly, some teachers retire while others resigned and abscond from teaching.

“The Commission also noted that there are teachers who choose to make themselves become unemployed because they do not want to take up teaching in rural/remote schools, while others just do not want to leave their home provinces to go and teach in other provinces that need teachers most.”

The Teaching Service Commission last week released a notice to all teachers to resume work on day one of the resumption week.

TSC said teachers are to return to work and to the position they were teaching in 2016.

Teachers in new positions are also expected to complete relevant forms before students resume classes.

“It is very important that you all resume on time and complete your resumption form and be on the payroll.

However, it should have been better with the outstanding funding of K7.826 million was given by the Government.

Teaching Service Commission Chairman, Baran Sori who is also the Chairman of the implementation taskforce said one of the biggest task that has now been complete was a data base for teachers.

He said having the correct knowledge of teachers’ recruitment and postings in a given calendar year was very important for Waigani to plan, administer and manage the 57,000 teacher workforce in the country.