Programme director
The Chairperson, Mr Lesley Chiloane
The CEO of Information Systems, Electronics and Telecommunications Technologies Education and Training Authority (ISETT), Mr Oupa Mopaki and staff representatives of various companies where learners were placed
Our distinguished guests graduating today, their families and friends
Ladies and gentlemen
I am honoured to be invited to share this exciting moment marking the successful completion of part of a lifelong journey to acquire skills and knowledge to develop our society and our economy. Achievement of any national qualification brings a great sense of joy to every hard working person. It is also very symbolic to hold this graduation ceremony at this place where the Freedom Charter was adopted in 1955 which included the clause: “The doors of learning and culture shall be opened”.
Let me take this opportunity at the outset to congratulate the over 500 learners who successfully completed their training and who are graduating this morning. These are essential qualifications in the area of information technology, ranging from national certificates in technical and systems support and development to business administration services. Not only will they open learners to a variety of occupations in information technology, these skills are critical to the needs of our developing economy. Let me commend all the learners for their commitment to their own personal development, to the growth of the sector and to our country.
I hope that with the new skills and learning that you have acquired, you will assist us to continue to build a strong economy and stable country. I urge you to provide strong leadership that is grounded in a sound ethical foundation and play a major role in transforming the world of work into places of social and cultural development as well as centres of excellence to meet targets and maximum productivity levels.
Programme director, I would also like to take this opportunity to commend the efforts of the ISETT SETA for their hard work in putting into the projects together with the employers, and the providers who contributed to the success of this training programme. Their collective commitment and hard work has borne the fruits that we are witnessing today.
The ISETT SETA was one of the best performing SETAs in terms of the Department of Labour’s performance criteria in the previous financial year and has also contributed positively to the implementation of the National Skills Development Strategy (NSDS) II. The ISETT SETA has been and remains steadfast in living up to its key mandate to contribute to the NSDS objectives and has accordingly posted good performance results. To date, 15 000 learners have been trained through learnerships and graduate internship programmes with a 75% placement rate.
This was achieved through the growing participation and involvement of the information communication technology (ICT) companies to roll-out more learnerships and graduate internship programmes to address the growing and changing needs for IT skilled personnel.
The ISETT SETA’s function is to promote, facilitate and incentivise skills development in the information technology sector in the interests of a more professional sector and towards a more inclusive growth and developmental path for South Africa. A skills programme can therefore be a highly effective way for learners to get NQF qualifications while working full time and gaining experience in their chosen field of study.
The ISETT Seta has adopted a multipronged approach to skills development in the ICT sector which entails the following:
* Training current employees through employer directed and workplace based skills programmes to address the occupational gaps of employees.
* Providing financial incentives to employers who take up learnerships programmes to train the employed and unemployed workers, and guarantee a 75% placement on completion of learnerships programmes.
* Providing financial incentives to employers who take up graduate internship programmes to train and provide workplace experiential training to unemployed graduates.
* Accreditation and monitoring of training providers in the ICT sector.
* Providing learnerships and graduate internship opportunities to learners in the rural areas in partnership with municipalities.
The learners who have completed the eight credit-bearing learning programmes will benefit in terms of the National Qualifications Framework principles of portability and articulation. It is further pleasing to note that the following stakeholders within the sector have played a significant role in supporting the learners to achieve their qualifications.
1. Participating employers/companies
* Telkom
* Nokia Siemens
* Coral-I Solutions
* TSS
* Lexmac
* Kelly group
* SPL Communications
* Vodacom
1. Participating Training Providers
* Xtensive ICT Academy
* Bytes Peoples Solutions
* Torque-IT
It is important to continue to build partnerships with all sectors including the employers to galvanise skills development in South Africa. These strategic partnerships are underlined in the over-arching Human Resource Development Strategy which will be released later this year.
However, I would like to issue a challenge to the ISETT SETA this morning not to be complacent with merely meeting training targets but to push the boundaries to create “centres of excellence” in ICT, including in the public sector. These centres of excellence, as we have seen burgeoning in India, should also promote innovation and seek to set South Africa ahead of the pack in the information age.
Programme director, South Africa faces the enormous challenge of redressing the inequity of the past so that all the citizens of the country can become skilled and enjoy the benefits that were previously denied to them. It is also important to note that these types of training projects are guided by the sector skills priorities and should be aligned with the SETA’s strategic objectives. Ultimately, it should support the objectives of the National Skills Development Strategy (NSDS) and the national socio-economic imperatives of the country. ISETT is currently one of 23 SETAs across the economy mandated by the SDA to put the NSDS into practice.
A critical and integral part of the Skills Development Act (SDA) which was promulgated and implemented since 1998 is the NSDS, which aims to radically transform training and development in South Africa by improving both the quality and quantity of training to support increased competitiveness of industry and improved quality of life for all.
Since November last year the skills development sector became the responsibility of the Department of Higher Education and Training. At the time, I announced the extension of the NSDS II and current SETA licence by one year from March 2010 to March 2011 in order to allow us time assess the SETA landscape and design the architecture of the NSDS III in line with the new administration's strategic objectives.
Last week, we released the draft framework of the NSDSIII 2011/12 to 2015/16 as well as the proposed new SETA landscape for public comment. The new NSDS framework, among other things, seeks to strengthen the partnerships between SETAs, employers and institutions of learning and we wish to strengthen public learning institutions and the world of work in particular. The proposed new SETA landscape will reduce the total number of SETAs from 23 to 21 and provides for the creation of six new SETAS.
It also proposes the amalgamation of some of the existing SETAs and minor changes to others. Once adopted later this year, the new SETA landscape and NSDSIII will have far reaching consequences for the skills development sector. It is therefore important that all interested people and organisations participate in the public hearing process which is being managed by the National Skills Authority (NSA).
A further development was the finalisation of the DHETs five year strategic plan. We are now in a clearer position about how to tackle the challenge of the 2,8 million young people not in employment, education or training; whilst serving the needs of the entire post school community for access, quality and easy transitions.
Ladies and gentlemen, all these are important developments, and marks significant development opportunity for the education and training landscape. They provide a strong basis for NSDS III and the SETA landscape to strengthen pipelines for learning from training institutions into and for the workplace, and which yields a more rapid supply of relevant skills for the economy and for our country’s development.
Our strategic plan identifies clear mechanisms and a focused agenda for skills development institutions, SETAs, colleges (especially public FET colleges), government, and stakeholders to consolidate the education and training environment in South Africa. For this strategy to succeed, we need functional and performance-driven SETAs to work closely with institutions to strengthening these pipelines and support delivery.
My department is actively pursuing our overall goal of creating synergy between formal education and workplace training. We are determined to overhaul the education and training landscape so that more people are able to experience the success of the learners here today. We invite public institutions, the private sector and civil society to actively participate and join the skills revolution in our country.
Finally, I want to encourage learners not to stop but progress on this lifelong learning journey. Your completion of this programme shows commitment to the course of this skills revolution. I wish you all the success in your chosen careers in the future.
I thank you.
