Court of Auditors Calls for More Efforts to Improve Education in Rural Areas

Rabat – The Moroccan Court of Auditors (MCA) recommended redoubling efforts to strengthen social support for schooling in rural areas, by improving living conditions in boarding schools, expanding school canteens, expanding school transport coverage, and improving transportation quality.

Schooling in rural areas is at the heart of the concerns of education and training strategies adopted in Morocco. These strategies are mainly represented in the National Charter of Emergency Education and Training Program and the strategic vision of 2015-2030.

The government’s interest in rural schooling is reflected in the increased cost of each students’ education between 2017 and 2019.

The operating expenses of each student increased from MAD 7,580 ($783) in 2017 to MAD 7,985 ($824) in 2019 in rural centers, which is an increase of 5.34%. Whereas an increase from MAD 6,391($660) in 2017 to MAD 6,788 ($701) in 2019 in urban centers, an increase of 6.21%.

Despite significant progress, a number of negative pedagogical phenomena such as teacher absenteeism, a lack of administrative supervision, and the student orientation system were identified, according to the annual report.

The dropout rate in rural areas, despite the many efforts, is still high compared to urban centers, especially in middle school. The dropout rate in rural areas was 12.2% during the 2019-2020 school season, compared to 9.3% in urban areas.

The dropout rate in rural areas decreased, between the 2019-2018 and 2020-2019 seasons, by about 0.9%, 1.7 percent and 1.4 percent, respectively, in primary, middle, and high schools, thanks to the social support programs for schooling.

The MCA also stressed the need to reconsider the ‘Tayseer’ program. The research on “social support for schooling” done by The National Observatory for Human Development in 2018 shows that the dropout rate increases by about 2.5 times for a person who is not a beneficiary of the “Tayseer” program compared to a beneficiary person.

The Tayseer program is a scholarship intended for students of need in rural and urban environments for primary and secondary education.

The MCA also evaluated the national program for inclusive education, which focuses on people with disabilities in accordance with the 2011 constitution of Morocco.

The court urged work be done to provide the necessary financial resources to finance the program. Gaps needing to be filled include, careful identification of disabilities and the adoption of a multi-year approach, as well as to equip educational institutions with accessibility and facilities so that persons with disabilities have sanitary conditions.

The report notes that 93% of primary school students and 74% of middle school students walk to school. Only 14% benefit from school transportation of preparatory students compared to only 2% of primary students. It should be noted that elementary students benefit less from school transportation than students in middle school, according to data published by Morocco’s Higher Council of Education, Training, and Scientific Research.

The data also cites that 14% of students in primary school and 26% of middle school students state that it takes them half an hour or more to get to school. The time it takes to reach the school deserves attention, especially for primary children in rural areas where schools are considerably far from where they live.

The same source states that a significant proportion of rural students were denied online teaching in 2020 due to the absence of equipment and connection to the internet.