Secondary schools, districts must have Fode: Official

ALL secondary schools and districts in Morobe should have a flexible and open distance education (Fode) centre that should be active this year to cater for school dropouts, an official says.
Morobe acting education adviser Keith Tangui said since the announcement by the Minister for Education Jimmy Ugoro on Tuesday that all students attending Fode centres and community colleges would not be charged fees this year, there was a need for these centres to be prepared.
“The minister’s announcement falls in line with the 3-6-6 policy and goes hand in hand with the Morobe government’s zero dropout policy,” he said.
Tangui said under the zero drop-out policy, the provincial government aimed to have all school-aged children in classes.
“I visited the Fode centre in Lae this week and noticed three new printers so that means all hard copy Fode learning materials for students at that level of education will not be a problem,” he said.
Tangui also said all district centres needed to have equipment such as laptops or tablets to download Fode learning materials while all secondary schools needed to have a Fode centre.
“In the end, we want to see that all secondary schools in the province have a Fode centre.”
He said the aim of having Fode centres in the districts and secondary schools was to ensure all school-aged children did not miss out on a chance to be educated.
Tangui said students who had withdrawn from schools during the state of emergency last year needed to return to their respective schools.