More junior high schools needed: Official

MOROBE education division is drafting a five-year provincial education plan to solve the issue of the influx of students and overcrowding by establishing junior high schools through the plan.
The provincial education adviser, Keith Tangui, made the statement following a question by the media on how the provincial education division and board is addressing the issue of the influx of grade 8 students to grade 9 and what is the province planning to do to tackle such in the future.
Tangui responded that the provincial education board is drafting a five-year plan that will also capture the level 8 schools that are eligible to be elevated to junior highs.
The province had witnessed a huge number of grade eight students passed the national
examination cut-off mark of 80 per cent and were eligible to do grade nine, but due to limited classroom spaces in the schools they were selected for, they had to be asked to transfer to other schools.
All the limited high and secondary schools in the province have exceeded the quota they used to get students, which would be around 30 to 35, but now they are getting 50, 60, and 70 in a class.
The idea of establishing junior high schools was to minimise the number of students going to high and secondary schools.
“We are planning in consultation with the five-year development and corporate plans for the province that was launched last year,” Tangui stated.
“We will do the planning and give it to the provincial government and administration, so they can take a look at it and plan for the next five years.”
Meanwhile, provincial Governor, Luther Wenge, publicly announced during the ground-breaking ceremony of Nawaeb
Lutheran secondary school’s K7 million Multi-Purpose Hall recently, that the provincial government supported the idea of establishing junior highs.