The Influence of Socio-Cultural Issues in Limiting Girls Primary Education in Makonde Societies-Newala District, Tanzania

The study is about the influence of socio-cultural issues in limiting girls’ primary education in makonde societies. A case of Newala Districts in Tanzania. This study focused on the following objectives; (1) To examine the views of education stakeholders on the influence of rites of passage in limiting girls’ primary education in Newala district.(2) To investigate the extent to which early marriages affect the girl-pupils academic development in primary school in Newala district.(3) To explore the attitude of the community towards educating girls.(4) To identify possible strategies to be taken to address the problem of socio-cultural practices limiting girls’ primary education in Newala district. The study used mixed approaches involving a total of 204 informants the study deployed purposive, simple random and stratified random sampling to select sample informants. Data were collected through documentary analysis, questionnaire, interview and FGD. A few quantitative data collected were analyzed using simple mathematical calculations while qualitative data were subjected to content analysis. Major findings showed that 3(03%) female pupil respondents’ views appeared to be neutral. The second group of respondent’s appeared to support and encourages the idea that the social cultural issues in limiting girls’ primary education, it involved 101 (70%) female pupils, 18 (100%) school committee female members, 18(50%) teachers and 05 (85.7%) head teachers, the third group of respondents’ views appeared to oppose and discourage the idea. It comprises of 40(27%) female pupils, 18(50%) teachers and 01(14.3%) head teachers. It is recommended that both central and local government, schools and mass media should organize public awareness campaign to continue raising community awareness on the importance of investing in girls’ education