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Kampala — RWANDA needs close to 1,000 English teachers following the country's switch from French to English as the language of instruction in schools.Rwanda wants teachers from Uganda and other neighbouring countries to support its switch to English.

"The Education Service Commission in collaboration with the ministry of education of Rwanda announced that the government of Rwanda has embarked on a massive recruitment of teachers of English," he wrote. "Teachers (will be sourced) from within and outside Rwanda; including the East African Community region."

owever, other sources say English teachers are needed across the country, giving an estimate of between 500 and 1,000 vacancies."ILMI is ready to hire talented instructors to teach English and/or Business English to government officials and business executives in Rwanda," read an announcement on ESL-Jobs, an online jobmart.

Two million people have been affected by the massive earthquake that struck central Chile on Saturday, President Michelle Bachelet has said.

The 8.8 quake - one of the biggest ever - triggered a tsunami that has been sweeping across the Pacific, although waves were not as high as predicted.

Chile is vulnerable to earthquakes, being situated on the Pacific "Ring of Fire" where the Pacific and South American plates meet. The earthquake struck at 0634 GMT, 115km (70 miles) north-east of the city of Concepcion and 325km south-west of the capital Santiago at a depth of about 35km. It is the biggest to hit Chile in 50 years.

MAKAMBA, 24 February 2011 (IRIN) - Unversed in Burundi's official languages of French and Kirundi, children of refugees returning after decades spent in Anglophone countries, such as neighbouring Tanzania, often find it difficult to continue their studies and some drop out.

To ensure such students continue learning, a group of returnee teachers has set up an education centre in the commune of Mabanda in Makamba Province, near Tanzania. The teachers work without pay. "We couldn't just sit back while our children faced a lack of education due to a language barrier," Norbert Bitaboneka, the principal, told IRIN. Swahili and English are the languages of instruction at the facility, the Centre Prévisionnel de l'Afrique de l'Est (East African Planning Centre), in line with the Tanzanian curriculum. The language of instruction in Burundian schools is French.

Most of the returnee students affected by the language barrier are those whose parents fled Burundi during civil war in 1972.

Dar Es Salaam — Though children attending private schools have been found to perform better than those going to public schools, their performance was far from better, a survey by Uwezo East Africa has established. Surveys conducted in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda on quality of primary education showed that in Tanzania and Uganda, pupils attending private schools performed relatively poorly.

In spite of numerous interventions by governments to ensure quality basic education for all Ghanaian children, the majority of children of school-going age in some parts of the Northern Region are still not in school.

Against this backdrop, the Right To Play, a child-centered international non-governmental organisation (NGO) operating in the three northern regions, has taken steps to ensure that all children of school-going age in their operational areas are enrolled in school.

The Right To Play, currently, operates in about 50 communities in four districts in the Upper East, Upper West and Northern Regions. The NGO is using all forms of play activities including drama, talent hunt and football competitions to effect changes in the behaviour and development of its target groups.

Shortages do not only concern developing countries. Although Sub-Saharan Africa alone accounts for more than half the demand, the United States, Spain, Ireland, Italy and Sweden are among the 112 countries suffering from the same problem.   Insufficient staffing to ensure universal primary education by 2015 affects the different regions as follows: Sub-Saharan Africa (1,115,000 teachers required), Arab States (-243,000 teachers), South and West Asia (-292,000), North America and Western Europe (-155,000). Central and Eastern Europe, Central and East Asia, Latin American and the Caribbean on the other hand together account for only 11 % of the global shortage of teachers required to meet the 2015 target for achieving universal primary education.   These figures, however, do not take into account the number of teachers leaving the profession for a variety of reasons such as retirement, illness, or career change. To meet the total shortage, 6.1 million teachers will be needed between 2009 and 2015.