State ‘forgets’ about 72 schoolchildren for a month

Parents at Khanyile Primary in Mooiplaas say their children have been abandoned by the state. 

Daily Dispatch was told that acting on an informal plea from a district office official, the principal decided to reopen the school despite the parents’ decision to close it.

This was in an effort to keep the children’s education going.

This meant that the principal had to combine Grade 6 and 7, and was teaching 15 subjects.

Another teacher had to combine two grades, leaving the entire foundation phase with no teacher at all.

A Grade 6 pupil, Siphumeze Maqobo, 13, yesterday pleaded with the government to help them get an education.

Maqoba said no progress reports were received in the last term because there was no teacher responsible for their class.

“We want the government to either give us teachers while we wait to be moved to the new school or get us transport as quickly as possible to the other school,” said Maqoba.

The department earlier announced that the school would be merged with Sotho Primary, about 12km away from Khanyile.

But there has been no merger. Instead the school finds itself with only two teachers to teach Grades R to 7.

In a 2013 document titled Infrastructure Development Plan, the department of education states that it plans to deal with infrastructure backlogs by rationalising small, non-viable schools.

The plan was to merge schools with less than 135 pupils because it was not cost effective to provide infrastructure for such a small number of pupils.

Gobe said they had been cooperating with the government in the “alignment process” even though it was painful to accept being merged with another school.

“We complied with all the requirements which were needed by the department because we want a future for our children.

“But now that their business is done, it’s like they have forgotten the paperwork,” said Gobe.