Parents and church leaders in Tsumkwe are concerned at the lack of discipline at the local Senior Secondary School hostel. 

The community shared their growing frustrations during a targeted dialogue hosted in the area by the Forum for African Women Educationalists in Namibia (FAWENA).

An elder from the Seventh-day Adventist Church, Kalola Joseph, says learners should be punished for misconduct and should be removed from the hostel if they are not disciplined.

"Kids, even in our homes, we are the ones who give up on our kids. Yes, we want to give up. Your kid is looking you down. Now they are coming to the school; they are looking the school down. They are coming to the police; they are looking the police down. Now who is taking over? Who is the head of us here? Let us chase that kid out forever so that we can see how the others behave; if not, we remove them too. Those ones that are poison." 

Mathews Ditavu, a parent, questioned the whereabouts of hostel supervisors when learners leave the hostel to participate in social ills.

"We want to make sure that as parents, why we put a supervisor there is to take care of these learners, those learners who came from their parents to here. They are now in your hands. Whatever we want to know, the report, the results, we want to hear from you. The officer was talking about a learner stealing; we know about that. Fighting, we know about that. There was a learner who wanted to step in front of a teacher here with a knife; we know about that. There were learners who went to the clinic and stole something there; we know about that. When those learners went in the night to steal, where was the supervisor, if there were any supervisors?" 

Despite learner misconduct, Christof Ngavetene, the principal at Tsumkwe Senior Secondary School, says the performance of learners has increased over the past four years from 6% in 2022 to 15% in 2025.