Between 2017 and 2019, the Ministry of Education failed to supply schools across the country with 71% of the textbooks they requested even though hundreds of millions of dollars were spent to procure books for students.
The information was contained in a special audit on the receipt, storage, allocation and distribution of textbooks to schools in Guyana.
The Audit Office found that although over $989 million worth of textbooks were purchased, the Ministry of Education was out of stock of core texts for several months.
The report noted that the Ministry did not deliver 71% of the 303,422 textbooks requested by schools in Regions 2, 4, 6 and 7 for the years 2017 and 2018. This caused shortages of textbooks at primary and secondary schools, as each learner could not receive a textbook for core subjects, as required in the Ministry’s Book Policy. The Book Distribution Unit also did not allocate and distribute textbooks to schools in an efficient and timely manner according to the needs identified.
The findings informed that there were shortages of core textbooks at schools, which prevented the Ministry from issuing a book to each learner. As a result, many grades had inadequate or no textbooks. Additionally, some schools had large numbers of excess textbooks, which could have been redistributed to those schools with a small amount or no books.
“On average only 19% of schools’ needs were met when we examined the needs with books received. A total of 11,358 textbooks were needed, but only 2,169 textbooks were distributed to schools. As such 81% of the needs were not met. Even though schools’ needs were not fully met, the Ministry distributed 756 textbooks to private individuals and organizations.
“There were no equitable allocation and distribution of textbooks to schools. While many schools had inadequate or no textbooks for learners in the various grades, we found 5,748 excess textbooks at seventeen (17) of the forty-seven (47) schools examined. There were thirty-seven instances where schools had more than 100 excess textbooks for core subjects being stored at the schools,” the Auditor General’s report stated.
The report further stated that Regional Education Officers failed to monitor schools to ensure that they comply with the requirements of the book policy and that all Head Teachers did not conduct self-audits to identify school needs. Additionally, Head Teachers did not ensure that accurate records were maintained for textbooks distributed to schools, class teachers, and learners. Some 10 schools did not loan textbooks to learners to aid in the completion of their home assignments, as required by the Book Policy.
The Book Distribution Unit did not always notify and distribute textbooks to the Regional Education Officers in a timely manner which resulted in notices being uplifted after the school term started, resulting in textbooks being distributed more than two weeks after the school term commenced.
The report also highlighted that the Regional Departments of Education also violated the book policy by not distributing textbooks to schools within the appropriate time.
