On 2nd December 2019, the Ministry of Education leaders held a consultative meeting with the Legal representatives and Head teachers of private primary schools. The goals of the meeting were:

         i.            - To acknowledge private investment in quality primary basic education;

      ii.            - To deliberate on key achievements and to address challenges on education standards, and

    iii.            - To strengthen teaching of languages, mainly the language of medium of instruction in Primary.

After discussions, the following resolutions were adopted:

 1.      Participants appreciated: a) Public Private Partnership (PPP) investment to achieve educational policy objectives; b) The contribution of private schools to improve access and quality education, and c) The need for improved quality of teaching and learning of languages in schools for better proficiency, and the need to use English language as a medium of instruction in lower primary (Primary 1 to Primary 3);

 2.      Cognizant of the concerns raised by private schools’ owners, parents, teachers and learners, and to address the observed low proficiency and Mastery of English Language in schools, the Ministry of Education has indorsed that all Schools use English language as medium of instruction in lower primary (Primary one to Primary three), and upper primary (Primary four to Primary six). The Ministry of Education reiterated the Government of Rwanda’s vision to improve proficiency of all languages, emphasizing learning of English Language as a medium of instruction;

 3.      Therefore, all schools (Private, Public and Government Aided) are required to put in place strategies to strengthen the teaching and learning of all languages, specifically English as a medium of instruction from early grades to achieve appropriate language proficiency. This is an important requirement, and schools are required to strengthen pupil/students debates, language competitions, appropriate measures to learn and use English language, and supporting and monitoring measures to ensure use of English language in class, on the school premises, and to ensure mastery of the language, so that it enables pupils/students to understand better and obtain higher scores in other subjects. All schools are required to strengthen teaching of Kinyarwanda to promote Rwandan cultural values, and teaching of French language to promote trilingual for global competitiveness.

 4.      The Government of Rwanda is committed to implementing school feeding program more especially in pre-primary and primary schools (as well as in secondary schools), and it was agreed that privately owned schools support and implement school feeding program in their schools mainly in pre-primary and primary schools, purchasing locally available nutritious foods especially milk in schools.

 Done at Kigali, 2^nd December 2019

Dr. Eugene MUTIMURA

Minister of Education