Mukupa Writes

 By Linda Mupemo  Cecilia Kaira (left) and Jane Nakamba at school  Chipo Siandindi confidently walks to the examination room clad in a school uniform and school shoes with her natural hair tucked into neat cornrows.  She beams with excitement as she nears the end of her secondary school education journey while at the same time smells the beginning of her tertiary one. “I am happy I am finally completing my grade 12. I want to be a teacher in the near future,” she tells this Reporter.   Chipo Siandindi Chipo,  a Chisamba Secondary School Grade 12 Pupil, reveals that her parents divorced when she was six years old resulting in her growing up with her mother and maternal grandmother. “My mother does not have a source of income; we survive on my grandmother’s Social Cash Transfer funds (SCT),” she says.  Chipo says she has been benefiting from the Keeping Girls in School programme since she was in grade 9 in 2021, a programme that has been enabling her mee...

By Linda Mupemo Zambia Union of All Persons With Disabilities President Pascal Mulenga - Picture by MISA Zambia Zambia Union of All Persons with Disabilities (ZUAPD) President Pascal Mulenga has called on Government to allocate more funds to education support for persons with disabilities.  Mr. Mulenga noted that persons with disabilities are facing challenges in accessing education especially in rural areas.  Mr. Mulenga said this in a media statement made available to ZANIS. He explained that despite the free education policy Government is implementing, some special needs children are still facing challenges in accessing education due to the severity of their conditions.   "Some special needs children have critical conditions which cannot allow them to be moving from home to school on a daily basis hence they need to be in boarding school. However, some parents to special needs children have limited financial resources to afford boarding fees hence their children a...

 By Linda Mupemo Picture for illustration purposes Milenge District in Luapula Province has made headways in the implementation of the re-entry policy as 46 girls who fell pregnant in 2021 have returned to school this year.    Milenge District Education Board Secretary (DEBS) Elie Shumba disclosed that 47 girls fell pregnant last year in the 60 schools across the district.      Speaking in an interview with ZANIS, Mr. Shumba said from all the pregnancy related drop-outs which were recorded in the last academic year, only one girl is yet to return to school.    "This is an improvement in comparison to the previous years. For instance, 83 girls dropped out of school in 2020 due to pregnancies and only 16 returned to school in 2021," he said.    Mr. Shumba attributed the high number of re-entries to heightened sensitisation by stakeholders coupled with the introduction of the free education policy....