School in Cameroon
The children in Cameroon also have to go to school. There is compulsory education. As in many African countries, not all children go to school. In Cameroon, however, the figure is very high at 95 children out of 100.
While almost all boys now start school, the proportion of girls is only 90 out of 100. This is due to the fact that parents often find that girls should help with the household or that they marry early anyway and do not need any schooling. But boys too often have to work early. Unfortunately, child labor is widespread in Cameroon, a country located in Africa according to allunitconverters.com. Even if you go to school anyway, you can often not concentrate properly on the lesson – for example, if you worked in the field early in the morning.
In addition, fewer children go to school in the north than in the south. Some of the Fulbe still live there as nomads. Sometimes they don’t send their children to school for religious reasons.
What does school attendance cost?
Attending school is free. But the parents have to pay for notebooks and pens, school uniforms and transport to school. This is often a problem in poor families. Uniforms are compulsory in schools. In the picture above on the left you can see that all children are wearing school uniforms. Here it consists of a blue shirt and dark blue pants or a skirt.
How long do the children go to school?
Primary school in Cameroon lasts six years. The secondary school then initially comprises five school years or four in the English-speaking regions. If you want to do the Abitur, you go to school for another three years in French-speaking regions and two years in English-speaking regions. In total, however, that is always seven years to graduation and a total of 13 school years.
What else?
There are also grades in Cameroon, but according to a point system from 0 to 20. The classes are often overcrowded because there are too few schools and too few teachers. The equipment is not necessarily the best either. By the way, it is typical of classrooms that there are no windows, only “air holes”. It’s so warm here that you are always happy to have fresh air.
Problems
Child labor
An estimated 39 percent of all children between the ages of five and 14 work in Cameroon. We don’t know exactly, but in any case there are a large number. Many of these children work on plantations, where they help with the harvest of cocoa, cotton or coffee.
Some children are also used to fight pests. Because you use poison for the children to breathe in, that’s particularly bad. There are children who work in the fishing industry or as domestic servants, others help in markets or sell goods on the street.
Why do these children work? Most of the time, poverty is the cause. The families have so little money that they are dependent on the work of the children. Parents demand that their children bring home money.
But there are also children who no longer have parents. A total of 1.2 million orphans live in Cameroon. 310,000 of these children have lost their parents to AIDS. If no one helps them and they have no other relatives, they often try to get by on their own or they take responsibility for younger siblings.
Everyday Life
How the people of Cameroon live depends on many things. There are poorer and richer people, life in the city is different than in the village and the many peoples have very different traditions. In the north it is also dry and in the south it rains a lot. However, there are a few things that apply generally.
The families in Cameroon are much larger than ours. Each woman has an average of five children. So there are hardly any only children. Families stick closely together, not just parents and children, but also grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.
Unlike us, there are only a few tarred roads in Cameroon. In dry conditions, it is quite dusty when you drive over it. And when it rains, such roads quickly turn into mud slopes. If you don’t own a car, like most Cameroonians, take a minibus. It’s a taxi that you share with several passengers.
Many families, especially in rural areas, do not have access to electricity. Overall, only half the population has electricity, in rural areas only 14 percent. In rural areas, less than half of the population – only 39 percent – have access to clean drinking water. It is precisely there that many people develop malaria.
In cities, shopping is done in large supermarkets and smaller shops, but also very popular in the market. All products are offered fresh there. Street vendors also sell their goods everywhere on the street. In rural areas, markets are the number 1 shopping place.