Factors influencing childrens’ enrolment in pre-primary education in Kahama Township

The study aimed at investigating the trend of enrolment, explore factors influencing enrolment and examine measures taken by the government (council) and village leaders in order to improve children enrolment in pre-primary education with the specific focus on Kahama Township in Shinyanga Region. The study adopted a qualitative approach and an embedded single case study design was deployed in order to collect and analyse data by using thematic data analysis. Purposive sampling and simple random sampling procedures were used to select 68 respondents where document review, interviews, checklist, and focus group discussions were data collection methods. The main findings of the study indicate that an average of 24.6% of children enrolled between 2011 and 2013. The study revealed that contextual and school related factors including unqualified teachers, lack of government financial support, lack of clear policy guidelines, school-home distance, and household income, parent attitude towards education, poor teaching and learning environment were the major factors influencing children enrolment in pre-primary education in the council. Mechanisms and incentives such as provision of porridge to children, extra duty allowance to teachers, and free accommodation to teachers were applied by villages to improve enrolment. On the other hand, the council introduced pre-primary classes in each primary school and community sensitization as the strategy to improve enrolment. All the mechanisms above are too far to combat the problem. Based on the aforementioned findings, it is recommended that pre-primary education should be subsidized by the government, sensitization should be done to parents and school feeding programme should be strengthened in schools.