Rwanda Technical and Vocational Education Training Board (RTB) is set to put up 30 TVET centres of excellence, with one centre in each district. Speaking to The New Times Paul Umukunzi, the Director General of Rwanda TVET Board said that this will help offer high equality training programmes and attract more students into TVET system. “The centres will be tailored to the district’s economic potential. For instance, districts which are proficient in agriculture, their TVET centres will focus on agriculture and food processing,” he explained. The move, which the Board said will go a long way in addressing the country’s skills shortage, and drive economic transformation. “However, these centres are not new schools we are setting up, but upgrading the already existing schools and supporting them so they can become centres of excellence by putting up modern infrastructure, adequate equipment and qualified trainers so the training delivery in the centres are at the highest level” he said. He added that they have already started and two centres are already in place like the coding academy in Nyabihu District and other model schools are being established. We have not yet covered all the districts because this is a long journey that will take a few years. In this academic year 31,900 students were enrolled in technical secondary schools after completing their Ordinary level, however the target was to enrol 52,000 students. Umukunzi added to reach the target there is need to improve quality delivery in terms of training which can be done through these centres, because they will act as role models to other TVET schools in terms of quality education and service delivery. Students to be enrolled in the centres will be the ones who have been excelling academically, but this does not mean we are leaving behind other TVET schools but this is a starting point in terms of quality improvement in the programs we offer he added. Currently, there are 456 TVET schools with 76,955 students of which 44 per cent are females.
