The main objective of the inception conference is to benchmark the National Education and Evaluation Unit (NEEDU’s) work against international best practice and to officially launch the establishment of NEEDU. Starting deliberations today 17 March 2011 on a theme Quality Education Matters, this conference will end with the launch of NEEDU by the Minister on Friday, 18 March 2011 at 09h00 to 12h30, at the Southern Sun Hotel, corner Church and Beatrix Streets in Arcadia, Pretoria. A wide range of local and international education experts will address the conference.
As part of a series of strategic conversations on systemic evaluations, Minister Angie Motshekga found it prudent to hold a NEEDU inception conference to enable NEEDU to explore experiences and best practices from countries that have implemented a system of school reviews or school evaluations. It is also envisaged that such experiences will shape the thinking regarding the establishment of NEEDU.
In the light of the above, NEEDU has been engaging in a series of discussions and conversations that will help to refine mechanisms through which the evaluation and development of schools could be effectively undertaken.
NEEDU is still in a “sunrise period” with respect to its own emergence as a fully-fledged external evaluation agency in South Africa. As it develops its evaluation protocols and putting systems in place, it will benefit from regional and international experiences in terms of what works and what does not.
The report of the ministerial committee relied heavily on developed country models, and in particular the European models. An exploration of a few models in developing countries, similar to South Africa, will hopefully assist in providing a necessary widening of the international practices on school evaluation. There is a need for a dialogue about evaluation models that are used in both the developed and the developing world in order to inform the development of South Africa’s own model.
In 2008 the Department of Education appointed a Ministerial Committee to investigate and advise the Ministry on how the quality of education can be enhanced through an independent performance evaluation system. The work of this committee culminated in the establishment of the National Education Evaluation and Development Unit, commonly known as NEEDU. The core responsibilities of NEEDU are to identify the critical factors that inhibit or advance school improvement and to make focused recommendations for redressing the problem areas that undermine school improvement. The main task of this Unit will be to provide the Ministry with an authoritative, analytical and accurate account on the state of education in South Africa, in particular, on the status of teaching and learning in all schools.
It was agreed that an external agency had to be established to evaluate the entire education system and report to the Minister of Basic Education on the state of education in South Africa. The establishment of such an agency was essential because low levels of performance still persist widely in the system.
Since the 2009 elections, the South African government’s policies have been shaped by a new focus on accountability. This is based on the achievements of clear outcomes and their associated targets. Of the six priority areas in government policy, improving the quality of basic education is the number one priority. The Department of Basic Education has outlined its vision and targets in a document entitled: Action Plan to 2014 Towards the Realisation of Schooling 2025.
Source: Department of Basic Education
