Parents provide education

UNIVERSAL basic education (UBE) should be seen as a tool that has been developed entirely to support parental and community obligation in providing the child with quality and relevant education they deserve.
 This was echoed by a senior official of the Education Department at yesterday’s opening of the three-day church and State partnership seminar held at the Papua New Guinea Education Institute.
Assistant secretary for Policy, Planning and Research Joe Logha, said while the role of the department now was for effective and increased teacher training, curriculum materials production and procurement, assessment of teacher performances and salaries, and further infrastructure support to meet UBE expansion, the community should ensure its support through provision of relevant resources. 
He also urged provincial education advisors who were the provincial institution to closely liaise with communities and churches to ensure a smooth transition after the first year of the UBE’s implementation.
 “Planning is over and it was now time to get things moving together with the support from each and every stakeholder right down to the parents,” Mr Logha said During the first session of the regional discussions at the seminar, support by churches for the education system since the colonial era was also acknowledged by all participants.
And while churches were established right at the village level, what better partner in the UBE implementation could the Government and partner agencies have than these institutions.
The group, having elaborated on the demands by UBE on teacher training, highlighted that there must be a Government and church effort to ensure increases in trained teachers to meet increase in enrolments.