Secondary Education in South Sudan

A good quality secondary education system is increasingly recognised as being essential if countries such as South Sudan are to improve the health and well-being of its citizens, to support inclusive economic growth, and to strengthen a shared sense of nationhood. f the secondary school sector is to become a powerful force for good in South Sudan, it faces two major challenges. First, access to secondary education needs to be very significantly widened. Currently, South Sudan is ranked bottom in terms of secondary enrolment and the chances of a child making it through the education system and into higher education are less than 1%. Gender disparities, too, are among the widest in the world. In South Sudan as a whole there are less than 1000 girls in the last grade of secondary school. Second, it is imperative to improve the quality of education in the nation’s secondary schools. While we acknowledge that there are some schools that are making massive efforts and have a determined commitment to improve the quality of education that is provided, overall dropout rates are very high and learning outcomes are poor. To tackle the problems of poor teaching and learning, the most important step to take is to improve the quality of the teaching that takes place in the school. It is with these two challenges in mind that Windle Trust International launched a report in November 2017 at the General Education Annual Review Conference drawing attention to the chronic and critical neglect of the secondary sector and of the need for a sustained and comprehensive programme of investment to improve quality, increase access and expand facilities.