Some parents in Tanzania are sending children as young as three to boarding schools. This emerging trend denies the children much needed love and comfort, which can only be found at home.
Currently, there are no official figures available showing how many young children are sent to faraway boarding schools across the country. So how can this phenomenon be explained in Tanzanian society where children still form an integral part of the family?
The Citizen has explored several reasons why parents take their young children to boarding schools and talked to experts who gave their views on the same.
As the trend of taking young children to boarding schools continues to raise alarm bells, something needs to be done urgently. Perhaps setting the age limit for joining boarding schools would be a better starting point in reversing this trend.
Joseph* is a five-year-old boy who currently attends Martin Luther School in Dodoma. His grandmother decided that boarding school was a better place for him because his parents were going through marital problems which were affecting Joseph's wellbeing. She also decided to ask the school's administration staff not to allow anyone to visit Joseph without her approval.
Joseph's case is unusual because boarding school is normally attended by more mature children, who are independent enough to care for and understand themselves in the first place and are usually part of that decision.
However, a new trend is emerging in Tanzania where parents are sending off their very young children, from the age of four, to school, far from home.
Boarding schools are becoming popular among many parents across the country and the number of children taken to boarding school has been increasing year by year which has caused a number of concerns among stakeholders.
For instance a number of psychiatrists and education stakeholders believe that children who are sent to boarding school at such a young age are completely denied their rights.
"It's not right and we don't encourage that," says Augustine Njamasi, chairman of Tanzania Teachers Union in Dodoma Region. "I think that is a sign of laziness amongst parents who do that. A child needs to be raised by his or her parents at all times," said the chairman adding:
"Parents might think that they are doing the right thing but in reality they are affecting their children psychologically, letting them learn how to cope more with the school environment rather than being at home because to them that is a strange place ,that means they are betting with their children's life," she says, adding:
"When a child grows up she or he ends up thinking that they are supposed to be raised at school. And this happens and is done by parents who have gone to school and believe that they know because of the education they have."
http://www.thecitizen.co.tz/News/Shock-of-3-year-olds-in-boarding-schools-/-/1840392/2375756/-/tbj1kjz/-/index.html
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