Educational background

More from Father Avitus - on the Tanzanian educational system...

In Tanzania, Primary (Grade) School Education is provided by the National Government which provides free education to children through the seventh grade. The area of the three wards has 13 primary schools, each of which graduates approximately 70 students per year. However, the area has only one secondary school, located in Izigo. Each year these community graduate approximately 910 children a year but a small number, not more than 100 children, proceed to Secondary Education.

Sacred Heart Secondary School (SHSS) l is the only the only charitable secondary educational institution dedicated to the mission of educating orphans and children from the poorest families of the region. Compelling evidence indicates that education positively affects a person mentally, psychologically, spiritually, emotionally, morally, socially and physically. In an age of globalization, education seems to be the best inheritance that parents or a nation can bestow upon a child. Addressing the 40th Session of the United Nation’s Commission on Population and Developments in April 10, 2007, The Vatican Nuncio, Archbishop Celestino Migliore, emphasized the critical importance of education in Africa, stating “the best and cheapest way to prepare African for a better future is to educate all its youths, especially girls and young women.”

Enesco argues that educating the young people is the best investment.

“the investment in the human capital is the best investment on the longer run" and that "good education is a tool for developing the society and triggering its renaissance; given that the nation's strength is no longer measured by the nation's natural resources or capital or number of citizens or strength of its army, but by its thinkers and creators who trigger change and lead the development process".

We understand that our school cannot provide an opportunity to all eligible students from the community for a secondary school education, but educating 120 students each year at SHSS will make a significant and monumental difference.