Reality Check: Citizens’ views on education in a fee free era :: Sauti za Wananchi :: Publications

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Following the introduction of fee free education up to secondary level, 50% of citizens say the quality of education has improved. At the same time 35% think the quality has stayed the same while 15% think it has become worse.

These findings were released by Twaweza in a research brief titled Reality check: Citizens’ views on education in a fee free era. The brief is based on data from Sauti za Wananchi, Africa’s first nationally representative high-frequency mobile phone survey. The findings are based on data collected from 1,806 respondents across Mainland Tanzania (Zanzibar is not covered in these results) between 7 and 14 August 2016.

Despite half of citizens having this positive view, citizens do think that schools are facing challenges in the fee free era. In particular, the most commonly reported issues facing schools, according to parents, are lack of teachers (34%), and lack of desks (30%). Other challenges mentioned include lack of classrooms (13%) and lack of books (7%).

Currently, among the 8 out of 10 households (80%) with children, 90% of these have children attending public schools.While citizens appear to be positive about education quality in government schools in general, a majority - 6 out of 10 - would send their children to private school if both public and private schools were free. Although a significant minority of citizens (36%) say they would send their children to public school even if they had the choice, this strong preference for private schools does indiciate that citizens have some doubts about the quality of education in public school. The most popular reason for wanting to send children to private school is that the quality of education is better there (45%). But citizens also mentioned hard-working and motivated teachers (21%) and sufficient numbers of teachers (12%).