Sunward Park High School in Boksburg has become the first public school to transform learning into a fully digital platform. The school has eliminated the use of normal textbooks and converted to e-learning. All the learners now use tablets as a learning tool.
The school held an official ceremony to celebrate the conversion to a full digital learning and teaching platform. Deputy Minister of Basic Education Enver Surty attended the event where he congratulated the School Governing Body and parents for preparing the school for the 21st Century.
Deputy Minister Enver Surty threw his weight behind the project and urged learners and teachers to "embrace the resources, take good care of them and indeed make good use of resources’".
The school piloted the project in September 2012 under the guidance of Deputy Principal Enoch Thango in partnership with MIB Technologies. At the start of the school calendar in 2013 the entire school from Gr 8 to 12 began using the e-learning tools. A comprehensive portal with massive learning and teaching resources has been made available.
In a live presentation Thango gave the audience a taste of how the technology functions.
Reetesh Rajkumar, Sales and Marketing Director at MIB Technologies said: ‘’MIB shares your feelings in making an impact in our education system and that we at MIB are willing to share, discuss, enlighten, collaborate and consult with all of you here today in making this impact a positive one. We see the combination of Government and private partnership as the catalyst that will result in this positive impact’’.
The Department of Basic Education through the provinces has made great strides in broadening access to ICT for all schools across the country and in so doing has begun to bridge the digital divide.
The Khanya project in the Western Cape and the Gauteng Online project in Gauteng, in support of the implementation of technologies in schools, are projects that stand as beacons that pave the way to realising the full potential of e-learning.
On 5 March the department officially opened the Vhembe ICT Centre in the Limpopo Province which reaffirms the Department’s commitment to incorporating ICT into learning and teaching.
