Inkululeko Yesizwe Primary School, Vlakfontein
16 February 2009
Programme Director
The School Principal
Staff, parents, learners and officials
Ladies and gentlemen
Thank you for inviting me to open the new administrative block of the
Inkululeko Yesizwe Primary School.
I am here as a witness to a successful partnership between business and the
Department of Education (DoE).
I thank the Imperial and Ukhamba Community Development Trust for its
investment in the education of our communities. This is a partnership we
encourage and support.
An investment in education is an investment in the future. For many young
South Africans, quality education alters their future in fundamental ways. It
has been proven beyond a doubt that education impacts decidedly on enduring
patterns of poverty in families and communities.
"If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange apples then you
and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an
idea and we exchange these, then each of us will have two ideas."
Now that is education.
George Bernard Shaw wrote that in one of his plays.
How about this?
"Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit
with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. That's
relativity."
Who said that? Albert Einstein.
That is also education.
The Department of Education exists to improve the quality of education in
all our schools. It has been hamstrung in achieving that goal through the lack
of adequate infrastructure in many of our schools.
We have doubled and redoubled our efforts to close the gap in resource
provision between our rich and poor schools.
Since 2006, over 2 233 new schools have been constructed, 73 214 additional
classrooms provided, 6 297 schools provided with water and 2 242 with
sanitation and 11 574 with electricity. That has meant that our capital funding
has increased substantially over the past ten years.
Over and above this, the department has tried to redress the stark
historical inequalities in the distribution of education resource inputs.
Historically, one of the most visible forms of inequalities in the provision of
resources was the physical teaching and learning environments.
It's because of this that the department developed the National Policy for
an Equitable Provision of an Enabling Physical Teaching and Learning
Environment, as well as the National Minimum Norms for School
Infrastructure.
Overall, the policies aim to redress under-investment in our poorest
communities.
The norms and standards provide a clear classification of schools and a
minimum and optimum package that constitutes a functional and an effective
school.
It covers the following areas: classification of school types, capacity of a
school, space norm per learner, classroom size, school site size and location,
accommodation spaces required by a school, norms and standards for sports
facilities as well as norms and standards for basic services.
These norms and standards for infrastructure aim at equity in the provision
of the physical teaching and learning environment.
We require investment in school infrastructure. There are still too many
schools without libraries, laboratories, administration blocks and sporting
facilities.
Government needs the assistance of the private sector. The role and
participation of the private sector is critical to the success of our quest to
provide resources to our schools. Public-private partnerships are important in
order that services reach a broader base of the communities.
In October 2008 the European Union (EU) completed its rehabilitation of 27
schools, and earlier this month ArcellorMittal began a R250 million investment
in the construction of 10 schools â these are examples of some partnerships
that we have with external as well as internal donors.
It is encouraging to see that the partnership with Imperial Ukhamba
Community Development Trust has gone beyond the mere provision of physical
facilities.
Educators have been trained, Grade R educators helped to complete studies in
early childhood development (ECD), and learners taken on educational tours to
places where they were taught about their heritage and their past.
This goes a long way towards realising the objectives of our Foundations for
Learning Campaign, which is aimed at improving literacy and numeracy in primary
schools.
This four-year campaign was designed to create a national focus on improving
the reading, writing and numeracy abilities of all South African children.
It provides energy, direction, and inspiration across all levels of the
education system as well as in homes and the public domain to ensure that by
2011 all learners are able to demonstrate age appropriate levels of reading,
writing and numeracy.
In conclusion, congratulations on the opening of this administration
block.
I hope that you use it to serve the entire school community.
Congratulations to the Imperial Ukhamba Community Development Trust.
This partnership is a model of the type of support we want from our business
community.
I hope that many more companies will follow this excellent example.
Thank you.
Issued by: Department of Education
16 February 2009
Source: Department of Education (http://www.education.gov.za)
