Access to primary education for all school-age children is an important component of the universal education reform programs. Primary Education or Basic Education should be compulsory and accessible freely to all in order to meet the main aims of all the declarations and charters of education. According to a UNICEF report, out of every 100 students who begin primary school an average of only 34 complete the five-year cycle - the highest retention rate is about 42 percent in Chin State and the lowest retention rate is 26 percent in Kayah State.
Children drop out of school for several complex reasons, although the prime reason is based on families' financial status. For example, most of the cases of school dropout in the primary levels are strongly linking with economic factors. The high cost of tuition and school related fees are a major factor. School fees including enrollment, textbooks, exercise books, school cleaning, examination papers, sports fees, in school tutoring fees.
Students and their parents also face a large financial burden when they are forced to pay for private tuition classes to supplement what they learn in the classroom. High School teachers in Myanmar make only 5,000- 6,000 kyat per month, which is not enough to live on. In order to supplement their government salaries, most teachers are teaching private classes after school hours and forcing students to attend tuition classes if they want to pass the course. In addition, many teachers reportedly favor those students who attend their tutorials outside the classroom and are more likely to give them better grades. High school students reportedly pay from 3000 - 20,000 Kyats per month for private tuition classes.
According to the United Nations, 60 % of school-age children attend the schools. But this statistic might not cover the whole country, particularly in the ethnic minority areas where the schooling rate is very low. Only one third of primary students complete the five-year cycle and only 3 % of primary student reach Matriculation, the highest stage of basic education. Moreover, only 2 % pass the basic high school. Therefore, 98 % of schooling children have never finished the basic high school.
In reality, primary education in Myanmar fails to provide a free basic education for many of Burma's children. In most cases, the problem is financial survival for the children themselves. The consequence of economic downgrades in Myanmar has meant that the dropout rate is steadily increasing as children's families cannot afford to pay school fees and instead children are forced to leave school in order to work. Therefore, poverty and very low family financial incomes have the largest impact on the life of a child and is the main case behind the increasing student dropout rates.
About 75% of population in Kayah State is involving in farming. Urban population is only about 30%, while the rest live in rural and remote areas. It is no wonder that Kayah State is still regarded as black area and less flavored by central government which leads to the least developed region of the country. Due to the unstable political situation, poor economic condition and luck of knowledge of the important of the education are a major hindrance which affect to the people’s live. For the education point of view, in some remote areas, there is no access of education by the government due to unstable political situation and very far locations. Statically, 45% of children by the remote area do not go to school and 41% of them are enrolled in the primary schools but they do not go to beyond primary education. Around 10% of them get their way to middle school but only 3% could proceed to high school education in towns. Finally only 1% students of high school graduate could study of college or university. (Diocesan Statistic)
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