Only 15% of children aged between three and five are accessing pre-school education, according to the data from the Ministry of Education.
This is because only a small number have been established, the majority of which are based in Dili.
Deputy Minister of Education Dulce de Jesus Soares said pre-school was important for children’s mental and intellectual development and therefore it was important to invest in pre-schools to prepare children for the future.
“Scientific studies show that people learn literacy and numeracy skills in basic school not in high school, so if we don’t have good pre-schools then children will also not do well in their basic and high school education,” she said.
Soares said the government did not have the capacity to establish pre-schools in every area, but they continued to work with international agencies to develop community centers to give children more opportunities to learn.
In many rural areas children don’t start their education until the age of seven at basic school as they did not have access to early education.
As a result, Soares said many children faced learning difficulties in their first year of schooling as they did not know how to read and write.
This year UNICEF provided technical assistance and funding to the Timor-Leste government through the Alola Foundation to implement an alternative pre-school program in Viqueque and Ermera.
“This effort by the government is so children don’t lose their right to access early education,” said Soares.
Although alternative pre-schools are an initiative of development agencies and are not a formal policy of the Ministry of Education, she said the ministry supported the pre-schools by providing books and other equipment.
As alternative pre-schools are not allocated a proper building, she said they use community spaces to run their activities, including singing, drawing and storytelling.
Viqueque Women’s Association President Veronica Belo said she appreciated the program as it was helping to educate children.
“This is a very good program because we start educating people from a young age this means we are already preparing people for a bright future in the country,” she said.
She hoped that the early training program would help prevent gender-based violence and early pregnancy in the future because children will learn how to respect each other from a young age.
As part of the program, the Alola Foundation has established 138 pre-school centers in two municipalities, benefiting almost 200,000 children.
