Dugmore
6 June 2007
The Western Cape Education Department's (WCED) R7,685 billion budget for the
2007/08 financial year will be spent on developing human capital, to ensure
that our youth acquire the skills, knowledge, values and attitudes needed to
develop their own potential and assist in placing our country on a sustainable
and shared growth path.
Education continues to receive the bulk of the provincial funding with
37,12% of the 2007/08 provincial budget, up from 36,7%, or R7.115 billion the
previous financial year - a growth of 8% in nominal terms.
The WCED provides services for 947,815 learners, 30,872 educators, 1,452
public ordinary schools, 70 schools for learners with special needs, six
Further Education and Training (FET) Colleges at 39 sites, 112 Adult Community
Learning Centres at 301 sites and 446 subsidised pre-primary schools, and a
public service staff complement of 8,823.
The steady rise in per capita spending since 2002/03 reflects our commitment
to quality public education. In this financial year the department is spending
R6, 507 per capita on public ordinary school education. This is R445 more than
the national average, and the third highest total in the country.
Quality education for every one of our learners will only be realised if we
continue to direct resources in a manner that creates genuine equity and
redress and when our educators, parents and learners place teaching and
learning at the centre of their lives.
The greatest portion of the budget goes to the primary and secondary school
system, including schools for Special Needs. Personnel are equitably allocated
according to reported learner numbers, community poverty rankings and subjects
offered. Norms and standards funding is allocated according to national poverty
quintiles with the poorest quintile receiving, on average, six times more than
the least poor.
In the context of the ongoing strike in the education sector it is very
tempting to lose hope and become cynical. This we should not allow to happen. I
believe there is a serious commitment from our government to bring relief to
our teachers and it is critical that agreement is reached so that serious work
can continue to implement much needed incentives which have been budgeted
for.
In this process we need to respect the legislative framework and ensure that
unacceptable conduct is condemned by all of us. Let us exercise the rights and
freedoms we have won in a disciplined manner.
We are all aware of the impact of social pathologies in our classrooms, and
the burdens these add to our teachers. I want to salute those teachers who
prepare their lessons and inspire our children every day.
I salute those officials and Standards Generating Body members who work in
our schools daily giving support, guidance and strength to our schools. Schools
like Hector Peterson and Langa High that quietly opened their academic year a
week early; or iQhayiya High, which converted a 38% pass rate to 94% in one
year, are shining examples of good leadership.
As we enter the last phase of curriculum transformation and as we enter the
new era of a transformed WCED all of us must intensify our efforts to build
quality education for our learners.
By doing this we will inspire hope amongst our young people that they have a
role to play in fighting poverty and creating work. The challenges are
formidable but I believe that with the resources in this budget coupled with
strong partnerships with our communities, we will succeed.
Highlights of the 2007/08 Budget
Investment in people
R2,8 million has been assigned for a pilot course for school business managers.
The first 65 trainees - officials and FET college staff - are already being
trained as mentors. In January 2008 the first intake of 150 school
administrative clerks will commence a one-year training programme. In total R16
million has been assigned over the Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF)
period.
In 2006 a total of 1,875 educators were exposed to 38 different residential
courses at the Cape Teaching Institute, especially in the fields of Literacy,
Numeracy, Mathematics, Life Skills, Natural Sciences, Arts and Culture,
Technology and Mathematical Literacy.
The WCED is offering induction programmes to newly appointed principals and
deputy-principals, as well as courses to aspirant principals. We have budgeted
R9 million for specific training programmes that will improve the leadership
and management skills of 160 school principals, who will enrol for the first
year of an Advanced Certificate in Education. An amount of R121 million over
the 2007 MTEF has been specifically earmarked for the training of both teachers
and principals.
An amount of R1,8 million is assigned to bursaries for Mathematics and/or
Science students - ranging from R17 000 to R24 000 per annum for 4 years,
repayable through one year's service for every year financed.
The National Department of Education has made substantial funding available
to full time students in the fields of Languages, Mathematics, Science,
Technology, Agriculture - including those who wish to teach in the Foundation
Phase. These bursaries range between R35 000 and R40 000 per annum over four
years.
Over the 2007 MTEF an additional amount of R809 million is allocated for
personnel-related issues in education to:
* improve the level of remuneration of teachers
* hire teaching assistants especially in the foundation phase of the schooling
system
* to provide targeted incentives to teachers in critical subjects.
R48,5 million is allocated to develop and introduce an improved salary
dispensation for principals.
Redesign of WCED
There will be significantly increased support for schools from the new brand of
circuit teams. Each group of 30 schools will have a dedicated team of
curriculum advisers, special needs? education professionals, professional
support for institutional management and for school-based management, a
psychologist, a social worker, a learning support adviser, an IMG adviser and
an administrative development adviser.
The total cost for funding the re-design is R159 million, including
personnel, recurrent and non-recurrent costs. This will be phased in over a
three-year period. The outlay in 2007/08 will be R50 million, which will allow
for the filling of Senior Management Team posts and the initial resourcing of
districts.
Literacy and Numeracy
In November 2006 the WCED tested 82 879 Grade 3 learners at 1 086 schools. The
success rate for Grade 3 learners in literacy has improved from 39,5% in 2004
to 47,7% in 2006, an increase of 8,2%. This is an improvement of 12,2% over the
three testing periods.
We are less happy with the results of the numeracy study, which reflects a
decline of 6,3% from 37,3% to 31%. There are encouraging examples of some
successes by schools in the most poor quintiles and we are studying these
closely.
A major innovation was the appointment of 510 teaching assistants in 163
primary schools in 2006 to support teachers in Grades 1 to 3 in poor areas.
Indications are that they are making a difference, and we have continued the
pilot in 2007. In 2007/08 R16,8 million is dedicated to maintaining this
initiative.
To date 210 teachers have been put through 18 hours each of Early Literacy
training and 150 teachers have completed Early Numeracy courses.
Six-hundred-and-eighty-seven (687) teachers and managers have been through
three hours of training in the management and use of concrete teaching
materials. The department has also provided support materials in the form of
exemplar Grade R work schedules and CDs in English, Afrikaans and Xhosa.
A prominent feature of our strategy is the importance of family and
community literacy. There are simple things that every family can do to improve
reading, writing and arithmetic at home.
The provincial Language Transformation Plan to address issues of school
policy around medium of instruction and languages studied is another major
initiative. A teacher from each of the 16 project schools will commence with a
funded Advanced Certificate in Education in 2007.
Access and redress
The number of no-fee schools will be expanded by 233 for 2007, by including
both the poorest primary and the poorest secondary schools in national
quintiles 1 to 3, bringing the total number of no-fee schools to 652. This
means that parents of about 345 000 learners will not have to pay fees for
their children from this year.
This represents 37,6% of all learners in the poorest schools, which is a
considerable increase on the number of learners attending no-fee schools in
2006. Quintile 1 schools receive R738 per capita; quintile 2 schools R677 per
capita and quintile 3 schools receive R554 per capita. Over the 2007 MTEF,
R622,267 million is earmarked for the funding of the no-fee status schools.
R23 million will be spent on 98 scheduled maintenance projects at Quintile 1
and 2 schools throughout the province as part of the quality improvement,
development, support and upliftment programme (QIDS-UP), which is a focused
response to improve academic standards through better teaching and learning
conditions in these schools, by providing basic resources such as equipment,
supplies, infrastructure and personnel development.
The WCED has identified 377 primary schools, which are located in quintiles
1 and 2. These primary schools are the feeder schools to 30 of the poorest
secondary schools in the identified quintiles. In total there are 407 schools
in the project for the 2007/08 financial year.
Our school building programme continually seeks to keep pace with population
growth and to manage down the numbers in some of our over-populated schools.
Twelve new school buildings will be completed during the 2007/08 financial
year. They are: Samora Machel Primary School, Smutsville Primary School, Table
View Primary School, Khayelitsha No. 1, Khayelitsha No. 2, Delft N2 Gateway
Primary School, Dalebuhle Primary School, Kuyasa Primary School, Khayelitsha
Secondary School No. 1, Khayelitsha Secondary School No. 2, Khayelitsha
Secondary School No.3 and Khayamandi Secondary School. This will provide
accommodation for approximately 13,200 learners.
Other projects include the building of school halls, the completion of
additional classrooms and some maintenance costs. The budget allocation for
this is R178,038 million with R30,7 million going to maintenance; R40 million
to additional classroom backlogs in African communities; R80,2 million as the
provincial infrastructure grant; and R25,5 million on normal works. A further
R6 million is to be spent on emergency maintenance.
Twenty-eight (28) secondary schools serving historically marginalised
communities, were converted into focus schools over the three years from 2005
to 2008 - in the fields of: Arts and Culture; Business, Commerce and
Management; and Engineering and Technology.
R82 million for the period 2005 to end of March 2007 was made available to
the 28 schools to be used for buildings, infrastructure, information and
communication technology equipment, learner teacher support material, security,
marketing and advocacy, human resource development, monitoring and evaluation.
In addition to the normal establishment, 32 redress posts were also allocated
to the schools.
The budget allocation for this financial year for the focus schools is R30
million. As part of the 2007/08 phase of the project, more emphasis will be on
curriculum development processes, capacity and skills development and career
opportunity programmes.
Investment in the future
Expansion of Grade R with 6 000 learners in approximately 200 new sites over
the 2007 MTEF will be allocated R238,828 million, of which R52 million is for
Grade R expansion in 2007/08.
The Department has committed R149,573 million over the 2007 MTEF for
Extended Public Works Programmes in the area of Early Childhood Development
(ECD), to provide resource kits to ECD community sites, to increase the number
of ECD practitioners, and to upgrade their skills levels.
The Adult Basic Education and Training programme receives an allocation
increase of 10,54% in 2007/08, up from R23,571 million in 2006/07 to R26,056
million.
About R1,528 billion in total has been allocated, nationally, over the 2007
MTEF period for an adult mass literacy campaign. This will be done through
partnerships with non-governmental organisations, adult basic education centres
and volunteers.
FET colleges form a key component of the Human Capital Development Strategy
of the Western Cape. In terms of the Human Capital Development Strategy, the
WCED plans to increase the number of students registered at FET colleges from
60,000 currently to 180,000 by 2014.
This year, the colleges introduced 11 new Vocational Certificate Programmes
on Levels 2, 3 and 4 of the National Qualifications Framework. The total number
of students planned is 3 428. According to the draft national funding formula,
the estimated non-personnel/non-capital costs for delivering these programmes
will be R25,050 million.
The national Department of Education has capped the class fees for these
programmes and the estimated fee income for 2007 will be R12,142 million. A
national loan/bursary scheme guarantees R9,5 million of this amount. The
colleges are managing the financial aid schemes. It is further estimated that
full paying students will cover the outstanding amount, with no loss to the
colleges on the already capped class fees.
The allocation for FET increases from R264,527 million in the 2006/07
Revised Estimate to R309,637 million in 2007/08 - an increase of 17,05%.
School Safety
Our Safe Schools Project has a three pronged strategy: (1) focussing on
securing the external environment of our schools by providing physical
security; (2) working within the school environment to equip our learners and
teachers with skills in regard to learner behaviour, conflict resolution and
diversity management and (3), building partnerships and networks with the
community, South African Police Service, non governmental organisations and
other stakeholders.
This year the allocation to School Safety is R14,190 million. Of this amount
R5, 093 million is allocated to crime control interventions including access
control and armed response. R5,746 million is allocated to crime prevention
programmes driven by our Education Management and Development Centres and our
school clusters. The balance is set aside as a contingency budget which deals
with issues such as victim support and vandalism. The Call Centre allocation is
R560 000.
Work together towards targets
In the spirit of the Minister's call to reject mediocrity, this year has seen a
fundamental intervention in pursuit of quality matric passes in Western Cape
schools. Just before the end of the first term, school principals, governing
bodies and representative councils of learners signed target-setting documents
against standard templates for the first time ever.
After a process of analysis and consultation they have announced 2007 Grade
12 matriculation endorsement targets; matriculation pass targets; and targets
in regard to numbers of learners successfully completing Mathematics and
Science on both higher and standard grade.
We also want our schools to set targets to reduce the numbers of so-called
'dropouts'. Too many learners are leaving the system. If these learners drop
out because schools over-emphasise the target of an exemplary pass rate at the
Grade 12 level, then this is intolerable.
Although we can never expect a 100% retention rate from grade 1 to 12 and
more learners who pass grade 9 should register at our Further Education and
Training (FET) colleges, too many of our learners with the potential to reach
grade 12 are not making it.
We have assigned R1 million to help schools in the nodal zones of
Khayelitsha and Mitchell's Plain meet these targets through after-hours classes
and programmes.
To ensure service delivery we are amending the performance agreements of all
WCED managers to ensure that they provide 'adequate support' to our schools. If
there is a proven failure to provide support then the performance bonuses of
relevant officials will be withheld, or rank and notch increases may not be
granted. Consistent failure may even lead to incapacity and/or disciplinary
proceedings.
Enquiries
Gert Witbooi
Cell: 082 550 3938
E-mail: gwitbooi@pgwc.gov.za
Issued by: Department of Education, Western Cape Provincial Government
6 June 2007
