NATIONAL Minister of Basic Education Angie Motshekga has spoken of the “tremendous improvement” that has occurred in the Eastern Cape education department and announced plans to downgrade her department’s intervention in education in the Eastern Cape.
In as serious a situation as school education is in, in the Eastern Cape, one has to question who is telling the minister what, and whether she has the slightest idea of the true situation in the Eastern Cape.
Let her go and meet those pupils without teachers and let her tell them how much their education has improved!
For example, the tragic story of the Uitenhage school with 851 pupils and just two teachers is a scandalous disgrace. For the first term of 2013, 851 pupils have been without a teacher and deprived of their constitutional right to education.
The constitution is absolutely clear that “the best interests of the child are paramount”!
The Eastern Cape MEC for education Mandla Makupula and the minister should be hanging their heads in shame and should be resigning for their failure to address such a horrendous failure. Nobody can excuse such performance from highly paid state officials.
The South African Democratic Teacher’ Union (Sadtu) has persistently resisted the transfer of the 6800 teachers in excess to schools where they are urgently need. This means thousands more children are being deprived of an education.
The department appears to lack the courage to get a court order to instruct those teachers to move. Why?
Is Sadtu controlling the education department?
Equally, the education department is failing to supply the further 1200 teachers needed to make up the required total of 8000 teachers needed right now.
Are these actions in the best interests of the children who currently are without teachers? Today 23 teachers are needed in the school in Uitenhage!
One of the saddest accounts I have read is one of a pupil who has been going to that school in Uitenhage every day, in the hope that someone would come to teach him.
Read that again!
But this problem is not confined to one school. Earlier this year a Karoo school had four full classes of Grade 4 pupils and only one teacher for the four classes.
These are two of countless examples of the failure to provide the required education for all children.
Of course there are those teachers who, in the most difficult and poorest of circumstances, give of their very best every day, and they are to be highly commended. But sadly there are those who take a very different stance and give as little as possible.
I cannot but wonder what the young people, deprived of their right to a teacher and a proper education, must be thinking. How can they possibly respect a “profession” which has so betrayed them?
“Profession”? There is absolutely nothing professional about teachers in excess refusing to move.
What will these youngsters write about their teachers of 2013?
The divide between the “educational haves” and the “educational have-nots” grows wider by the day. The constitution is clear that education is the right of every child! Yes, the former so-called “Model C” schools are providing high quality education and those fortunate to be pupils in such schools are getting what every child deserves. But the reality is that principals and parents won’t tolerate teachers who do not work and nor will hard-working teachers tolerate second best from under-performing colleagues.
I have never been a great fan of inspectors and inspections but, in this present situation there need to be people to take charge of a disgraceful situation. Such appointments must be made, under whatever title, with clear instructions to enter classrooms, to check and moderate work done and provide reports to the department on non- or underperforming schools and teachers. The taxpayer has a right to demand that his or her money is not wasted on “teachers” who either refuse to, or fail to, carry out their full professional responsibilities.
One of the most fundamental issues of the early school years is that children learn to read. There can be no negotiation on this point.
When Xhosa-speaking children from very deprived backgrounds are able to read in English in Grade 1 in one school, and at the same time there are reports of 80% illiteracy among Grade 6 pupils in other schools in East London, something is seriously wrong.
The core of the issue in almost every case is the individual teacher.
How is the most urgent and critical change going to be made to happen?
The status quo cannot continue.
If the Eastern Cape education department is not strong enough to act and demand high quality performance from their employees, that is, the teachers, then parents may have to act and enforce the changes.
Every day that the children get little or nothing from their five to six hours at school is another day of educational deprivation.
It is time for parents, for church ministers, for business leaders, for city councilors, for members of the legislature and for every taxpayer to raise their voices and demand the changes that are needed. And they need to go on demanding until every child gets the education they are constitutionally entitled to!
What is being experienced by teachers in the Eastern Cape cannot be said to reflect any improvement. Either the national department must engage in a carefully planned intervention to address all the major issues, or must instruct the Eastern Cape MEC for education as to what should be done and monitor the situation very closely, and hold the MEC accountable.
Dr Ken Alston is an Eastern Cape educationist
Insight: Time to demand change in state of EC education
In as serious a situation as school education is in, in the Eastern Cape, one has to question who is telling the minister what, and whether she has the slightest idea of the true situation in the Eastern Cape.
Let her go and meet those pupils without teachers and let her tell them how much their education has improved!
For example, the tragic story of the Uitenhage school with 851 pupils and just two teachers is a scandalous disgrace. For the first term of 2013, 851 pupils have been without a teacher and deprived of their constitutional right to education.
The constitution is absolutely clear that “the best interests of the child are paramount”!
The Eastern Cape MEC for education Mandla Makupula and the minister should be hanging their heads in shame and should be resigning for their failure to address such a horrendous failure. Nobody can excuse such performance from highly paid state officials.
The South African Democratic Teacher’ Union (Sadtu) has persistently resisted the transfer of the 6800 teachers in excess to schools where they are urgently need. This means thousands more children are being deprived of an education.
The department appears to lack the courage to get a court order to instruct those teachers to move. Why?
Is Sadtu controlling the education department?
Equally, the education department is failing to supply the further 1200 teachers needed to make up the required total of 8000 teachers needed right now.
Are these actions in the best interests of the children who currently are without teachers? Today 23 teachers are needed in the school in Uitenhage!
One of the saddest accounts I have read is one of a pupil who has been going to that school in Uitenhage every day, in the hope that someone would come to teach him.
Read that again!
But this problem is not confined to one school. Earlier this year a Karoo school had four full classes of Grade 4 pupils and only one teacher for the four classes.
These are two of countless examples of the failure to provide the required education for all children.
Of course there are those teachers who, in the most difficult and poorest of circumstances, give of their very best every day, and they are to be highly commended. But sadly there are those who take a very different stance and give as little as possible.
I cannot but wonder what the young people, deprived of their right to a teacher and a proper education, must be thinking. How can they possibly respect a “profession” which has so betrayed them?
“Profession”? There is absolutely nothing professional about teachers in excess refusing to move.
What will these youngsters write about their teachers of 2013?
The divide between the “educational haves” and the “educational have-nots” grows wider by the day. The constitution is clear that education is the right of every child! Yes, the former so-called “Model C” schools are providing high quality education and those fortunate to be pupils in such schools are getting what every child deserves. But the reality is that principals and parents won’t tolerate teachers who do not work and nor will hard-working teachers tolerate second best from under-performing colleagues.
I have never been a great fan of inspectors and inspections but, in this present situation there need to be people to take charge of a disgraceful situation. Such appointments must be made, under whatever title, with clear instructions to enter classrooms, to check and moderate work done and provide reports to the department on non- or underperforming schools and teachers. The taxpayer has a right to demand that his or her money is not wasted on “teachers” who either refuse to, or fail to, carry out their full professional responsibilities.
One of the most fundamental issues of the early school years is that children learn to read. There can be no negotiation on this point.
When Xhosa-speaking children from very deprived backgrounds are able to read in English in Grade 1 in one school, and at the same time there are reports of 80% illiteracy among Grade 6 pupils in other schools in East London, something is seriously wrong.
The core of the issue in almost every case is the individual teacher.
How is the most urgent and critical change going to be made to happen?
The status quo cannot continue.
If the Eastern Cape education department is not strong enough to act and demand high quality performance from their employees, that is, the teachers, then parents may have to act and enforce the changes.
Every day that the children get little or nothing from their five to six hours at school is another day of educational deprivation.
It is time for parents, for church ministers, for business leaders, for city councilors, for members of the legislature and for every taxpayer to raise their voices and demand the changes that are needed. And they need to go on demanding until every child gets the education they are constitutionally entitled to!
What is being experienced by teachers in the Eastern Cape cannot be said to reflect any improvement. Either the national department must engage in a carefully planned intervention to address all the major issues, or must instruct the Eastern Cape MEC for education as to what should be done and monitor the situation very closely, and hold the MEC accountable.
Dr Ken Alston is an Eastern Cape educationist
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