however, girls have a higher rate than boys. Net Enrolment Rate is the best way of measuring organized on-time school participation. NER is calculated by dividing the number of properly aged primary pupils (6-13 years of age) by the population of primary school going age (6-13 years). NER has been declining from 111 in 2013 to 88 in 2017. Special Needs 181 About 2.8 percent (146,048/5,073,729) of total primary enrollment were learners with special needs. Drop outs and reasons - primary and secondary Graph 2 – Dropouts in Primary Schools – Source – Ministry of Education, Science and Technology 182 In 2017 there was a total of 97514 males drop outs and 104057 female drop outs. Mangochi district has the highest proportion of school dropouts at 9.3 percent, followed by Machinga with 7.3 percent. Learners drop out of school because of various reasons. Some of them being violence at school, sickness, pregnancy, poor facilities especially for girls, lack of support, lack of interest by the learner, early marriages, traveling long distance to school, lack of fees, family responsibilities, employment and unavailability of teachers. 64