Natural hazards and education : the impact of floods on primary school education in Zambia

The study has been designed to investigate how floods affect primary education in the flood plains in Zambia. Both qualitative phenomenological and quantitative comparative methods were used for the study. Two communities with primary school going children (those affected by floods and those not affected by floods within a 5 years period) were investigated and compared. It was found out that children in the flood plains compared to those in the upper land have low net school enrolment, the rate of repeating classes is high, dropout rate is high and performance in national examination is low. This will affect human capital and development in the flood plain environment in the long run.