Schoolbooks and its problematic in the DR Congo

Schoolbooks, or textbooks, are the bridge by which official education programs embody the lessons during classes. The textbook concept is about book including educational elements for students such as texts reading, practice exercises and more, and teaching guides and online educational resources. Textbooks are effective tools that enable better understanding for students and make possible a wider diffusion of knowledge and national education program.

The Democratic Republic of Congo’s schoolbooks case brings up many questions, especially the ones concerning the state of educational system. It is impossible to miss the fact that education in DR Congo is precarious (UNICEF 2011 : the report revealed that more than the half of the adult population have never seen the four walls of a classroom). And the classes’ conditions are almost unbearable (Annual Report 2017, from a local NGO Juste Cause Congo). In most of schools, there are no textbooks and no libraries for both the teachers and students. The rare libraries lack recent books; the old books that could be found within are old and scruffy, mainly related to foreign matters than local ones.

In many cities of the DR Congo’s east region, such as the Nord-Kivu region, schools lack basical equipment; classrooms are built with light materials and pupils sit down on the ground cause there is no desk. There is no board, no chalk to write on it and no schoolbooks. This situation is very actual in small towns: Nduba, Burhale and Izege located in Walungu territory. The supervisor of the Mana primary school in Kabare territory said: “the main cause of our education’s low level starts with the government’s inaction to ameliorate the education’s quality and accessibility; teachers are not paid, schools are not provided with basical equipment as well as pedagogic guides”. The analysis reveals how much is hard to take as prior the textbooks matter, when facing lacks of other more basical school tools such as pens, pencils, notebooks, etc. For decades, schools in Congo have been depending on NGOs actions and donations: UNICEF (through their campaign in 2011, “back to school”, in partnership with the Congolese government and the 2013-2017 campaign, “education above all”), CARITAS (through their partnership in 2015 with UNICEF and the Qatar Foundation to helping the undereducated children in
Kinshasa and the Kwilu, Kwango and Kongo Central regions), the Belgian Cooperation (from 2011 to 2015 via the special program “school rescuing”) and others. The donations’ amount was up to USD 1150 for each targeted schools in 2015 by CARITAS-UNICEF programs.

Although it is said by some observators that « reading is not part of the Kivucian culture », the real problem remains the unavailability of books all over the national territory. The region possesses only two libraries – Humanitas and Centre Bandari, both belonging to missionary institutions.

No need to say how important are schoolbooks and proper equipment in classes and schools for improving the education system and make it move forward. The government’s commitment is highly necessary to improve the education quality in the country.

HERI Audrey.