Address by the Deputy Minister of Basic Education, Mr Enver Surty, MP, on the occasion of the debate on the President's State of the Nation Address

15 Feb 2010

Regenerated quality education as a basis for building a movement of learners; teachers; and parents for quality education in all schools

Education is the great engine of personal development. It is through education that the daughter of a peasant can become a doctor, that a son of a mineworker can become the head of the mine, that a child of farm workers can become the president of a great nation-Nelson Mandela. There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul than the way in which it treats its children-Nelson Mandela

When the great Nelson Mandela walked through the gates of Victor Verster prison twenty years ago, he was confronted by a racially fractured education system, constructed on the Verwoerdian notion of subservience and baasskap and steeped in the discriminatory practices of racism and sexism.

Lever and Krafchik in an article titled Spending on Socio Economic Services (1998) clearly captured the challenges that the system faced by stating, “It has been estimated that prior to 1994 around 64 percent of the black population was functionally illiterate. Numeracy and technical skills were widely lacking. The majority of black teachers, who comprise the bulk of the nation's teaching corps, were under qualified. The school system for Africans was in disarray and disorder and most African pupils failed to complete more than eight years in a schooling system which was, anyway, highly ineffective. The new government inherited a ramshackle system of partially desegregated schooling that continued to be characterized by great racial inequalities in per capita expenditure from public funds. Resource constraints, both physical and human, made the effective implementation of the curriculum at most black schools highly problematic.”

The post-apartheid African National Congress (ANC) government has done remarkably well in dismantling the apartheid edifice in education and in extending formal access to learners in the compulsory education phase with nearly universal enrolment. The period after 1994 was characterised by dramatic strides in the equalisation of education expenditure. Today m ore children are staying at school until Matric and it is estimated that about 85 percent of children are now receiving 12 years of education either in schools or colleges.

In addition, millions of learners are exempt from paying school fees, and the national nutrition programme provides for nutrition to approximately 19000 schools, which is a total of 6 265 065 primary schools learners and about a million secondary school learners. The scheme that has been expanded to include learners from the poorest quintiles in high school has already shown evidence of improved attendance as a result of this intervention.

Yet we continue to be confronted by the stark realities of some 40 percent of our schools being overcrowded and hundreds of schools without water, sanitation, electricity and schools with inadequate infrastructure or which are unsafe. In recent months we have witnessed the effects of tornados, storms and inclement weather which destroyed schools in the provinces of KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Eastern Cape and North West. This is a matter that must be resolved swiftly as our learners cannot be exposed to the elements. To compound the problem, there have been instances of vandalism and theft of school property. We cannot allow this to happen to our schools, which are our islands of hope. We must mobilise our communities to take ownership of our schools and to act as the custodians and protectors of our institutions of learning.

Despite significant advances, the primary measure of quality in education, i.e. learner achievement, has continued to lag behind. There are a number of reasons for the continued underperformance of the South African schooling system. These include poor management of schools by principals, inadequate teaching, lack of content knowledge among teachers, lack of support to schools by district and provincial offices, a heavy administrative burden on teachers, limited time on task and weak acquisition of foundational skills by learners.

There is a growing consensus internationally that achieving quality in the schooling system will require a clear and unrelenting focus on three main components of the system viz. Teachers, Texts, and Time. To this I may add technology. Nic Taylor has put it very aptly, “Three features of our school system combine to undermine effective teaching and learning: poor time management, insufficient attention to text, and very low levels of teacher subject knowledge. The accumulating evidence indicates that with respect to these three factors our teachers and schools are significantly worse off than those of our much poorer neighbours in the region.”

The Coleman Report of the 1960s in the United States of America (USA) found that “the in-school factor that was found to have the most significant effect on achievement for all students was good teachers.” The quality of teachers becomes a yardstick for the quality of an education system. But this is well-trodden territory and our partners in the unions will be quick to point out that this kind of analysis could indeed easily slip into blaming teachers for the educational woes of our country. The simple point we are making though, supported by a range of commentators, is that well qualified and competent teachers, arriving on time, of sober mind and body, well prepared for their lessons and teaching for the duration of the school day, are the most critical element in the improvement of educational systems, not only in South Africa, but indeed across the world.

The best investment any country can make in its efforts to improve the quality of its education system, occurs in its pre-school sector. It is here where the foundational skills in literacy and numeracy are established which prepares children for primary schooling. The positive effects of early education for later educational success and career progress are now universally acknowledged. Government's vision for Early Childhood Development is that it will serve as the bedrock for the holistic development of the child. It is scientifically and empirically established that the most critical and significant cognitive development of a child occurs from birth to four years. It is when a child also develops fine motor-skills and acquires attitudes which are either positive or negative. The role of parents in this important phase cannot be ignored. To this end the Departments of Basic Education and Social Development are working closely together to ensure that practitioners and caregivers are able to contribute meaningfully and purposefully towards the full development of the child.

As the President indicated, literacy and early childhood development initiatives will go a long way in creating employment opportunities but more importantly in developing skills in the critical areas of education for social transformation. For example, the Kha Ri Gude programme employs 40 000 practitioners who have successfully eradicated illiteracy among just under a million adults in the past two years. Fortunately literate parents or grandparents are able to provide support to infants and children as they grow up. Thus the initiatives are not only economic in nature, but have a social dimension that benefits the recipients as well as generations of future learners.
Government has embarked on a massive drive to expand Grade R provision. In 2003 there were approximately 320000 learners in grade R classrooms in public and independent schools and by 2008 this number had increased to 620000. We estimate that there is an additional number of around 200 000 learners who are attending community based sites.

In January 2010 we distributed Grade R resource packs to all primary schools as part of the foundations for learning campaign. These packs are based on the National Curriculum Statement for Grade R and contain posters, storybooks, lesson plans for teachers, a teacher's guide with an assessment framework and a workbook for learners. The packs have been very well received by teachers and schools and we are optimistic that they will make a huge contribution to improving learning and teaching in our Grade R classrooms.

The department remains committed to the provision of high quality learning and teaching support materials to schools and teachers in 2010 and beyond. The department is proceeding with the development of workbooks for learners in Grades one to six and Minister Motshekga will make an announcement in this regard during her budget vote next month.

Minister Motshekga initiated a process last year to strengthen the implementation of the school curriculum. She announced measures which were implemented from the beginning of this year that aim to relief teachers of an unnecessary heavy administrative burden to allow more time for learning and teaching in the classroom. This process of strengthening the implementation of the curriculum will continue this year and we will take the necessary steps to ensure that all our learners benefit from what is a sophisticated, high skills and modern curriculum statement. We have also instituted a committee of curriculum experts to make recommendations on the reduction of the number of learning areas in the intermediate phase. It is envisaged that these recommendations will be implemented in January 2011.

We have taken the necessary steps to ensure that all grade 3, 6 and 9 learners will write literacy and numeracy tests in 2010 that will be independently moderated. Government is committed to improve the average pass rate from the current 35 percent to 60 percent by 2014. These tests will be internationally bench-marked and quality assured.

Our 500 Dinaledi schools continue to demonstrate that our learners can perform well above the national average with the necessary focus and support. In three years we were able to more than double the passes in Mathematics. In 2009, 52 779 learners passed Mathematics at 50 percent and above. Out of the 52 779, 12 213 (23,7 percent) learners came from Dinaledi schools which make up just under 9 percent of the 6 000 high schools. This was done by providing each learner with a calculator and text book, providing teacher support in terms of content knowledge and by providing extra tuition and additional learner resource materials. Let me take this opportunity to congratulate Mbilwi Secondary School in rural Limpopo, one of our Dinaledi schools, which managed to obtain a 99 percent pass rate in both mathematics and physical science in the 2009 grade 12 examinations. This gives credence to the targeted interventions proposed by the President.

We shall develop a Basic Education Action Plan that will form the basis of our efforts in basic education to address the weaknesses in the education system. This plan will seek to improve coordination in the system by spelling out clearly the lines of accountability. It will commit provinces and provincial education departments to clear, agreed to outcomes and to ensure that all in the system are accountable for the attainment of these outcomes.

We also intend to operationalise the National Education Evaluation and Development Unit (NEEDU) to ensure that we evaluate all parts of the system to lay bare the constraints that prevent the achievement of quality in education. The visit by officials of the Department of Basic Education (DoBE) to the 27 000 schools must be understood in this context. This will form a diagnostic analysis of the functionality of each school, from management to classroom practice, resource provision, overcrowding, leadership and management, discipline and infrastructure.

The South African Schools Act directs each principal to provide the Head of Department with a performance management plan. Our visits to schools have indicated that the content, analysis and purpose of these performance plans are not clearly understood by some principals, and are regarded merely as a routine exercise for compliance.

Education is the apex priority of this administration. We shall work cooperatively with all the key stakeholders in education, especially our teacher union partners, to build a renewed commitment to quality education at all levels of the system. We have committed to a social compact in education that commits all the role-players to a set of non-negotiables.

It is no accident that the President has elevated education to a societal issue. You will notice that the President refers not only to teachers but also to learners in the non-negotiables clearly indicating the reciprocal role of learners and teachers to ensure that a culture of learning and teaching persists. The pledge in the Quality Learning and Teaching Campaign (QLTC) includes parents and circuit, district, provincial and national officials. The success and functionality of each institution therefore depends on the collective will to succeed. The President has already had a meeting and interaction with more than 1 500 principals and a report on the issues raised and the responses of the department is to be adopted in the next Council of Education Ministers meeting.

Mr President, the Department of Basic Education is ready to openly and honestly tackle the many challenges we continue to confront in education. We call on all South Africans to take hands with us to ensure that we turn our education system around. Together we can do better and more. May we also take this opportunity to extend our best wishes to our Grade 12 learners writing their supplementary exams from today. Our thoughts and best wishes are with you and remember that the Study Mate support materials, as well as previous examination papers including memoranda, are available on the departmental website http://www.education.gov.za.

Allow me to again convey my deepest sympathy to the Ramorola and Motshekga families on the untimely passing of Jabulani. Our thoughts and prayers are with you during these difficult times.

In conclusion, Mr Speaker, given that we are celebrating 150 years of the arrival of Indians in South Africa, it may be appropriate to end with a quote from another icon Mahatma Gandhi, who developed his political consciousness in South Africa, “There will have to be rigid and iron discipline before we achieve anything great and enduring, and that discipline will not come by mere academic argument and appeal to reason and logic. Discipline is learnt in the school of adversity.”

I thank you

Issued by: Department of Basic Education
15 February 2010
Source: Department of Basic Education (http://www.education.gov.za/)

 

Issued by: Department of Basic Education

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