South Sudan’s Eastern Equatoria state Thursday launched a Back-to-Learning Campaign at the Torit Municipal Council to encourage the enrolment of children and school dropouts in the state. 

The campaign was organized by Windle Trust International under the theme 'My Teacher, My Hero'. 

Sikuku Ruth, the education director at Torit Municipal Council encouraged parents to bring their children to school while calling on both the government and the education partners to build more schools to accommodate increasing numbers of pupils.

“Parents have to take up their roles so that they send their children to school, and without teachers, there will be no learning. We can also have teachers but if parents are not sending their children to school, it means learning will not take place. So we are requesting parents to send their children to school," she said. 

According to the education official, the enrollment rate has improved compared to previous years.

"Within the municipality, when I compare the enrollment to last year when we had the launch at the Grace Community School I think it is now somehow okay. So far we have enrolled 11,027 as compared to last year only 9,000. Teachers are still registering and we still have more who are coming from outside, I hope by the end of this year we shall have maybe 15,000 learners," Ruth added.

She further expressed concern for pupils in the county's eight payams saying some of them only have two schools. 

Loboi Clement, the director of education in Torit County admits there is a need to embrace education in the country. 

“Your teacher is your hero in the sense that he or she brings you up morally and academically so that you fit the society in the future. Ladies and gentlemen we need to embrace and understand the value of education. It is civilization, it is an agent of transformation which would help us to develop, to bring this country to peaceful coexistence with our brothers and sister around us," Clement stressed.

Speaking at the same event, Mazaura Michael Chipo, said in addition to encouraging learning to get back to class, the government to ensure teachers are motivated and properly trained. 

"There is a say by UNESCO that no country is better than the quality of its teachers, that means if you want to have a quality and organized country we must invest in teachers because whatever we do even if we send our children to school and we don’t invest in teachers, we buy the best textbooks we don’t invest in teachers we shall not progress and we shall not have quality education in South Sudan," Michael said. "Therefore, we need to invest in teachers even if we construct these nine classrooms and we bring all the necessary facilities if we don’t invest in teachers we are not going anywhere."  

One of the teachers in Torit, Benny Melle, explained that many of his colleagues have deserted the profession due to poor and delayed pay, lack of promotion and overcrowded classrooms.