Education, Employment and Earnings of Secondary School-Leavers ...

2. BackgroundIn the aftermath of Tanzania’s independence in 1962 education policy focussed onexpanding access to basic education as a key component of the government’s socialisteconomic and social development strategy. 2 Tanzania achieved rapid success, withenrolments in primary schools increasing four-fold during the 1970s, reachingprimary gross enrolment rates of 100 per cent by the early 1980s (MOEC BEST1985). 3 These dramatic increases in primary education access were not matched byincreases in secondary school enrolment. The access to the latter was restricted bothbecause of resource constraints arising from primary school expansion, and becausethe Government restricted the establishment of private secondary schools in anattempt to reduce inequality of access. 4 Rising primary school enrolments with limitedsecondary school expansion resulted in a decline in the proportion of primary schoolleaversprogressing to secondary level. The proportion of standard VII leaverscontinuing to secondary school plummeted from over one-third in 1961 to under onefifthin 1967, and by 1980 was only seven per cent (see Knight and Sabot (1990)).The war with Uganda and its consequences were largely responsible for theTanzanian recession experienced during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Theeconomic downturn and the subsequent adjustment policies led to major declines inprimary school enrolment rates, which by 1990 had declined to approximately 70 percent. The impact was very different for secondary schooling. Parental pressure andconstrained government finances led to an easing of restrictions on private andcommunity schools during the 1980s (see Samoff (1987)). As a consequence,secondary school enrolments doubled between 1984 and 1990 (MOEC BEST, variousyears), largely because of increases in the number of private schools, but also throughrising numbers of community-built government schools.2 At the time of independence secondary and tertiary education were strengthened to provide skilledmanpower for public administration.3 The primary gross enrolment rate for Tanzania is defined as total primary school enrolment dividedby the seven to 13 year old population.4 Parents demanding greater secondary school access tended to be concentrated in particular areas ofthe country and allowing private schools to be established in these areas would have led togeographical inequities in secondary school provision. See Samoff (1987) for a detailed account ofthese issues.3