#FeesMustFall and JZ – two readers, two views

I am a 20-years-old born and raised in the Eastern Cape. I have never been to varsity nor have I ever been part of any of the wonderful higher education system.

I know you might be asking how a young person with just a grade 12 as a qualification would think of writing to you about the current situation of higher education, but I always wanted to go to varsity.

In fact, wanted to become a doctor so I can heal other young people who happen to be victims of the sickness I have – asthma.

But I must say the quality of your education system is quite alarming. As a product of that system I, like most learners, could not get the marks I needed to go to become a doctor.

Most people might say that like most black students, I have excuses for my failure. Well for me, I like to call them obstacles. One of these obstacles was my maths teacher, who played a big role in who I am today. He would insult everyone who failed, or may I say got less than 50% in his subject. Unfortunately for me I was one of the learners struggling with this subject.

He saw failure in me when I saw myself as a doctor.

But I believe he never demotivated me – he made me stronger, hence I am a youth practitioner and youth activist today.

For me it was quite weird how I came from wanting to be a doctor to becoming a youth activist. Maybe it is because my teacher chased us from the extra maths class, saying we did not need classes and were “beyond repair”.

Or maybe it is because we were chased out of career guidance classes. The teacher always asked what we were going to do with the information as we were not going to qualify anyway.

I hope now, you understand this letter is about a matter so close to my heart. I actually commend those who qualified for university. That is an achievement on its own. There are thousands of young people who were not fortunate and did not.

I am also very proud that after 21 years of freedom it is safe to say we have young people who are ready to lead this country. For me the #FeesMustFall protest is history in the making. On its own it proves the born frees are not just about parties and alcohol, but have something to offer.

I am sure you are quite shocked by the recent movements of the young people, but really what did you expect after they have put up with so many things? Did you really not see this coming – after so many memorandums, letters and petitions?

It is sad your country takes young people for granted and does not see value in them. It is also alarming that youth development has been so politicised.

I am very disappointed that after you were part of the struggle you forgot how strong young people are. Or have you forgotten the class of 1976? Or Tsietsi Mashinini? Or Hector Peterson? Or did you think their spirit had died?

Well Mr President, I think these are the questions you as the leader should be asking yourself. You should know by now that in South Africa young people fight for their own education, that these young people are serious – they value education and know it is the way out of the webs of poverty.

I must admit it was quite alarming to see how the parliament delegates could continue with the budget while the students were outside trying to get their attention. Do they take us seriously? Do they know the power of young people? And what does that say about our leader?

For me this is really something one should think about. Are we different from the class of 1976 that had to fight for their education? Yet that is what patriotic young black South Africans are doing now.

I hope you will hear my thoughts, my fears and my opinions and that you now know the born frees are not dead. — L Silwana, via e-mail

THE President made a tactical decision and saved the day with his appeasement of the students. He did the sensible thing by taking control of the steering wheel and stepping on the brakes, preventing what threatened to be a runaway truck of social upheaval.

But what is not so clear is why the problem was allowed to fester until we were faced with an eruption of riotous behaviour and the humiliating submission of the government to student demands. It seems the ANC had not been opposed to the idea of free education all along.

Fortunately the President realises he has not solved the problem but has only kicked the can down the road. He has promised a dialogue on the matter. But what are the real choices for society?

Having tasted victory, it’s unlikely the students will agree to a hike in tuition any time in future. We could just submit to universal free education for all university education. It will be at a cost.

The economy, expected to rise at barely a percentage point, is no help. Our deficit is high. In his budget speech Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene used every nice word to avoid sending the country into panic. But he could have been describing a country near bankruptcy.

We could increase taxes for everyone. But that could depress the economy as spending slows as people have no cash.

We could reduce free services such as housing and other state expenditure and freeze salary hikes for the public sector. But once people are used to a privilege it’s not easy to withdraw it.

We could cut down on wasteful spending and corruption. We know the housing benefit is being abused and tenders are taking the last shirts off our backs. But that’s easier said than done. Corruption is well entrenched in government.

Perhaps the students could come up with ideas on where the money should come from. The President has promised a dialogue and it will be interesting to see how the issue of funding free university education can be resolved.

The bigger headache for the President however, is that people now know that to get him to act you simply need boots on the ground and a strong toyi-toyi.

An even bigger challenge for the nation is that student fees are only a part of the problems in our education system. We hope the President will not confine his dialogue to student fees. He should address all the problems that have rendered our education system unable to deliver quality education for learners.

Our teachers are ill trained both in content and teaching skills; our schools are the only system in which productivity is not monitored. A teacher can sit in the classroom all year round teaching the numbers 0-9 without anybody noticing he/she is behind in implementing the syllabus. Our SGBs lack supportive systems.

For example they are unable to write grant proposals to get funds from foundations and socially progressive businesses to enrich the school environment for children. And even if they did, because they are elected for a three-year term, that experience would be lost every three years.

Currently we have learners who cannot even begin first grade because of a lack of transport to school; we have a shortage of math and science teachers yet we have no incentives in place to attract learners to these fields and into the teaching profession generally.

Our learners are linked from kindergarten to college by a chain of substandard education. Fixing only one section of the chain will not solve the problem.

We hope the President will consider appointing an education Czar with a mandate to fix our education system at all levels. — Wongaletu Vanda, via e-mail