Education minister Valentine Uwamariya has said that the ministry is mulling a proposal to reduce the burden of an inadequate number of laboratories in science teaching secondary schools.

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The minister was on Tuesday, March 28, responding to MPs’ queries on the issue of the lack of laboratories in some schools teaching science courses, and that some of the schools that have laboratories lack the required equipment to enable students’ acquisition of practical skills.

This was during the session with the Lower House’s Committee on Education, Technology, Culture, and Youth. The session discussed the issues identified in general education during officials’ visits to schools in different districts of the country from November to December 2022.

Uwamariya said that as of the academic year 2020-2021, laboratories had been set up in 329 secondary schools, equivalent to 14.9 per cent of all the schools that needed them.

"This really confirms that this laboratory issue is serious,” she said, adding that though there were no laboratories in the majority of the schools, they tried to provide basic equipment like science kits. In the financial year 2020-2021, some 1,126 science kits were provided, indicating that they covered 50.9 per cent of the schools in need.

In the current fiscal year (2022-2023), Uwamariya said that 525 science kits are planned.

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MP Léonard Ndagijimana suggested that because some science schools do not have laboratories or laboratory kits, practical components should have a small share of marks in the national examinations, to avoid unfair management to the affected students, and give equal opportunities to students in the national examinations.

He said that the issue of schools that do not have laboratories "is alarming”, and indicated that schools are asked the same practical questions during the national examinations, regardless of whether they had enough laboratory-enabled practical skills.

"There are cases where a student understands sciences in terms of theory, but when it comes to practical exams, he/she fails,” he said, indicating that such an issue can make them lose some academic opportunities.

"This is a problem. I think that you should consider whether the practical exam can account for a small percentage of marks in the national examination – may be to assess whether they (students) have practical skills,” he told officials.

Ndagijimana said schools that are most affected are the 12-year basic education establishments, where students have to sit practical exams for chemistry, physics, or biology, indicating that students are unfairly treated because of such exams.

In response, Minister Uwamariya said, "It is an issue that students do the same national exams, yet they did not study in the same way, especially for science schools that lack laboratories, but the government is trying to provide science equipment to the schools in question.

"There is a proposal to reduce the marks we allot to practical examinations, but also setting them in a way that the student who did not get enough equipment is able to succeed,” she said.

She pointed out that because laboratories are expensive, having one at each school was constrained by limited resources, adding, "The plan is that we want to have one laboratory that students can jointly use on a rotational basis, but ensure that every student has access to that.”

Meanwhile, Uwamariya said that as long as they have not yet built laboratories so that all schools have access to them, the main focus is on increasing science kits, though they do not offer a long-term solution like laboratories do.

MP Christine Muhongayire said that there is a need to put more effort into increasing access to practical skills for students doing science courses so that they are able to partake in laboratory-based experiments.