Tajik Schools Short of Teachers, Money
Secondary schools are failing their pupils because of chronic underfunding, Davlatsho Shoetiborov reports from Dushanbe.
Tajik Schools Short of Teachers, Money
Secondary schools are failing their pupils because of chronic underfunding, Davlatsho Shoetiborov reports from Dushanbe.
Tajikistan is short of teachers as the wages on offer are so low, and many schools do not have enough of the basic textbooks to go round
According to education expert Umedjon Abdulloev, “After graduating from higher education, the good ones don’t go for jobs in schools. If teachers were paid a decent salary, we’d be able to recruit experienced, qualified teachers on a competitive basis.”
Isroil Qurbonov is typical of many teachers – he gives chemistry classes in three different state secondary schools just to make ends meet.
With 38 years in the profession behind him – half of them under Soviet rule – Qurbonov believes today’s schoolchildren are indifferent to education and their level of knowledge is generally poor.
The reporter interviewed Muhammad Karimov, a Dushanbe resident who works in a barber’s shop and receives disability benefits but still finds it hard to provide for his family of five children. He complains that the three who are at school have little motivation to turn up since their teachers are often absent, and that in consequence they are not learning much.
Hamza Novruzov, the departmental head responsible for secondary schools at the education, accepts that there are some problems but insists that standards overall are higher than in earlier years.
The audio programme, in Russian and Tajik, went out on national radio stations in Tajikistan, as part of IWPR project work funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
