Education: 87% of 5th grade students do not master a simple calculation

At a meeting held Thursday in Salé, by the association of Moroccan laureates of the Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussés in France, Chakib Benmoussa said that only 13% of students in the fifth year of primary school are able to perform a single-digit division, which means that 87% do not master a simple calculation.

These figures are based on a study conducted by the tutelage and involving 3000 students in the third, fourth and fifth years of primary school.

In addition, according to data from the Higher Council of Education, Training and Scientific Research, highlighted by the Minister, only 30% of students in the sixth year of primary school manage to master the curriculum.

In this sense, and in order to achieve an efficient and effective education system, the Minister urged officials of public and private schools to engage more to promote better quality of education. “The generalization of primary education is an achievement for Morocco, however, it is now time to aim for quality and fight against school dropout,” he said.    
In order to remedy the current situation that seriously affects the national education system, it is important, according to Benmoussa, to adopt a modern approach based on the quality of courses rather than on the quantity, because a significant number of students are behind by 4 years compared to their peers of the same level.    
In order to achieve this ambition, the Ministry of Education has adopted a reform based on three major axes, namely the student, the teacher and the school. The objective, according to Benmoussa, is to have students at the end of the primary cycle who demonstrate a mastery of the basics of writing, reading, comprehension, and the Arabic and French languages.    
Ultimately, it is no longer a secret that the development of a successful school and able to meet the challenges of the future in terms of transfer of knowledge and development of skills and values requires, now, the collaboration of the whole society, including civil society and economic actors.