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More than 160 students — nearly 30 percent of the student body — at D.C.’s celebrated Duke Ellington School of the Arts live outside the city and are not paying the tuition required of suburbanites who attend the District’s public schools, an internal investigation has found. The findings, which city officials announced Friday, come amid intensifying distrust of the District’s public schools, stoked by scandals involving inflated graduation rates and a former chancellor skirting enrolment rules for his daughter.

As another school year begins in Afghanistan, the country continues to face insecurity, an epidemic of corruption within its education system and old customs that keep many students and qualified teachers away from classrooms. Violence and corruption are problems that can hardly be solved on grassroots level only. Increased violence forced more than 1,000 schools to shut their doors since 2016 and according to a report compiled by the country’s independent corruption monitor, corruption is “devastating” the education system and the country.

Thanks to the introduction of a new biometric census system, education authorities discovered the presence of 47000 fictitious students in public and private universities in the capital Conakry. Thanks to this information, the government will able to better equip its universities and teaching staff, by making sure that funds are directed where they are most needed. The Minister of Higher Education has indicated that this process may also pave the way for the introduction of an automated university access system.

The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) launched a report on the Free Primary Education (FPE) programme, after the Ministry of Education revealed that most schools cannot account for the funds. According to the EACC Chief Executive Officer, the report will help in ensuring accountability in public schools, given that heads of schools will be required to detail how every shilling allocated by the government is spent.

A report by the Joint Legislative Public Account Committee (PAC) has linked a former Minister of Education and his deputy to misapplication of US$60,493 during their tenure at the Ministry of Education. The money, according to the report, was intended for the Government of Liberia Free and Compulsory Primary Education program.

The Minister of Primary and Secondary Education last week slammed the parents for paying Form One entrance examination fees saying they did that at their own peril as the Government has set an enrolment date for all the schools in the country. He said the entrance exams were banned long back by his ministry and have remained illegal and should not be left to continue. Enrolment of Form One students for next year started yesterday with parents expected to use their children's Grade Seven results.