No power, no ceiling, leaky loos – yet the pass rate stays high, and so does morale.
Despite the dilapidated state of Mbasa Junior Secondary School near Butterworth, the hard work of teachers and pupils has seen the school perform consistently well.
The school has no electricity and its toilets are in a bad state. The buildings, which have no ceiling, are falling apart. Teachers say when it rains, water comes in through holes in the ageing corrugated iron roof.
Pupils often get painful rashes from asbestos exposure. Yet the pass rate stays above 80%. This was attributed to the tenacity and resourcefulness of the teachers and pupils.
Principal Nomataru Ntshona has been at the school since 1996 and has been a principal since 2007.
She told the Dispatch that pupils always get infections because of the bad conditions of the school. “We are always taking kids to the clinic because of asbestos exposure to the skin which causes a serious rash,” said Ntshona.
Ntshona said the school makes use of a small diesel generator that two of the older and stronger schoolboys have to carry out of the principal’s office and start up to make food for the pupils. There is no kitchen area to make food but Ntshona said they make do.
The school’s success with its pass rate comes from good teachers, according to Ntshona.
The parents fund a teacher from Zimbabwe, who teaches ground phase Mathematics and English from Grade 1 to Grade 3. That, said Ntshona, helped a lot.
They have a few computers, which pupils from ground level phase use. They are run off a generator but there is no internet access.
The school caters for pupils from Grade R to Grade 9.
“Our children are doing very well. We are the best school in the area,” says Ntshona.
The school boasts six trophies which it won at the Eastern Cape schools’ festival for creative arts.
New toilets, promised by the education department, were supposed to be completed by April this year.
Construction had just begun, with a concrete base for long drops, when the contractor stopped work. Now there are dangerously gaping three-metre holes – and the toilet situation had not changed.
The education district office referred the Daily Dispatch to the province for comment.
Provincial spokesman Loyiso Pulumani did not reply to questions e-mailed on Friday. — aronh@dispatch.co.za
B’worth school defies all the odds
Despite the dilapidated state of Mbasa Junior Secondary School near Butterworth, the hard work of teachers and pupils has seen the school perform consistently well.
The school has no electricity and its toilets are in a bad state. The buildings, which have no ceiling, are falling apart. Teachers say when it rains, water comes in through holes in the ageing corrugated iron roof.
Pupils often get painful rashes from asbestos exposure. Yet the pass rate stays above 80%. This was attributed to the tenacity and resourcefulness of the teachers and pupils.
Principal Nomataru Ntshona has been at the school since 1996 and has been a principal since 2007.
She told the Dispatch that pupils always get infections because of the bad conditions of the school. “We are always taking kids to the clinic because of asbestos exposure to the skin which causes a serious rash,” said Ntshona.
Ntshona said the school makes use of a small diesel generator that two of the older and stronger schoolboys have to carry out of the principal’s office and start up to make food for the pupils. There is no kitchen area to make food but Ntshona said they make do.
The school’s success with its pass rate comes from good teachers, according to Ntshona.
The parents fund a teacher from Zimbabwe, who teaches ground phase Mathematics and English from Grade 1 to Grade 3. That, said Ntshona, helped a lot.
They have a few computers, which pupils from ground level phase use. They are run off a generator but there is no internet access.
The school caters for pupils from Grade R to Grade 9.
“Our children are doing very well. We are the best school in the area,” says Ntshona.
The school boasts six trophies which it won at the Eastern Cape schools’ festival for creative arts.
New toilets, promised by the education department, were supposed to be completed by April this year.
Construction had just begun, with a concrete base for long drops, when the contractor stopped work. Now there are dangerously gaping three-metre holes – and the toilet situation had not changed.
The education district office referred the Daily Dispatch to the province for comment.
Provincial spokesman Loyiso Pulumani did not reply to questions e-mailed on Friday. — aronh@dispatch.co.za
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