Rwanda’s basic education system has been commended by one of the top donors to the sector, Peter Kramer, the chief executive officer of Marine Service Group and co-founder of Schools for Africa initiative.

Kramer commended the progress made in the education sector, especially in areas of inclusion and access to free primary school education, after meeting President Paul Kagame yesterday at Urugwiro Village.

Kramer said his foundation, which works in partnership with the Nelson Mandela Foundation and UNICEF, was impressed by the strides in ensuring access to quality education in Rwanda and across Africa.

The initiative has since inception in 2004 worked in a number of African countries to improve the learning environment, provide classrooms equipped with furniture, provide learning and teaching materials as well as amenities such as drinking water and sanitation facilities.

Rigorous government efforts have seen Rwanda reach 97 per cent primary school enrollment, through programmes such as the 9-year basic education and partnership with agencies.

Peter Kramer said that ,going forward, his initiative would continue working closely with the government and UNICEF to continuously improve the sector and reach more learners.

The State Minister for Primary and Secondary Education, Olivier Rwamukwaya, said the partnership with initiatives such as Schools for Africa had gone a long way delivering the levels of access to education achieved.

He said the partnership, which began in 2008, had seen programmes such as Early Childhood Development Education (ECDE) and pre-schools scaled up across the country.

He said that the partnership with the initiative will this year see such programmes scaled up even further and an additional number of schools constructed.

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