Dliwane said it was not fair that they were suffering.
“We don’t understand some parts of the past (exam) papers and we have no-one to ask. We even thought of requesting that a maths teacher from another school comes to assist us but that would also require that our parents fork out money.”
Nontando Thethani, secretary of the school governing body, said parents simply could not longer afford to pay for private tutors.
“We have done everything in terms of informing the department about this,” Thethani said.
“Last year we had 340 pupils and we thought that was why the maths teacher was taken. We had to ask parents to fork out money every week to pay the tutor. It’s two teachers now that we don’t have and parents here depend on social grants. We cannot afford this any more,” she said.
The school’s matric pass rate dropped from 70% in 2018 to 64% in 2019.
“Now we fear it might drop again. We had a meeting with an education inspector on Wednesday but we were told that the department is bound by the PPN,” Thethani said.
Thethani accused the department of “playing tricks” to have the school closed.
“Numbers will drop and they will tell us about rationalising. This is not fair on our children. They are dedicated but the department is failing them.”
Another parent, Buyiswa Xengeshe said: “My child is in grade 9 and I am worried that a few years from now, there will be less teachers in these classes.”
“This is not sitting well with us a parents and it goes against everything Angie [education minister Angie Motshekga] said, that there should be a teacher in front of the child in school. They are depriving our children of quality education and their future.”
Education department spokesperson Loyiso Pulumani had not responded to queries by the time of writing.
ziyandaz@dispatch.co.za
No maths, English teachers for matric pupils at Mdantsane school
Image: Gallo Images/ IStock
Five weeks into the new school year, pupils at one of Mdantsane’s oldest schools are still without maths and English teachers for grades 11 and 12.
Parents are livid that the provincial education department has allowed the situation to develop at Solomon Mahlangu High school in NU13.
About 100 pupils are affected.
The absence of a grade 11 and 12 maths teacher since March last year has meant that parents must pay for a private tutor out of their own pockets.
Two weeks ago, an English teacher left the school because of post provisioning norms (PPN), according to parents. PPN is a formula-driven model that primarily allocates teachers to public schools based on pupil enrolment numbers.
The school serves 382 pupils from grades 8 to 12.
Representative council of learners (RCL) secretary Thando Dliwane, 19, said parents had run out of money to pay the private maths tutor.
“It’s better with English because we can use the previous year’s textbooks but maths is a different story altogether. We don’t even know where in the syllabus we are and maths is a critical subject. We practise (maths skills) four times a week among ourselves but that is not helping.”
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Dliwane said it was not fair that they were suffering.
“We don’t understand some parts of the past (exam) papers and we have no-one to ask. We even thought of requesting that a maths teacher from another school comes to assist us but that would also require that our parents fork out money.”
Nontando Thethani, secretary of the school governing body, said parents simply could not longer afford to pay for private tutors.
“We have done everything in terms of informing the department about this,” Thethani said.
“Last year we had 340 pupils and we thought that was why the maths teacher was taken. We had to ask parents to fork out money every week to pay the tutor. It’s two teachers now that we don’t have and parents here depend on social grants. We cannot afford this any more,” she said.
The school’s matric pass rate dropped from 70% in 2018 to 64% in 2019.
“Now we fear it might drop again. We had a meeting with an education inspector on Wednesday but we were told that the department is bound by the PPN,” Thethani said.
Thethani accused the department of “playing tricks” to have the school closed.
“Numbers will drop and they will tell us about rationalising. This is not fair on our children. They are dedicated but the department is failing them.”
Another parent, Buyiswa Xengeshe said: “My child is in grade 9 and I am worried that a few years from now, there will be less teachers in these classes.”
“This is not sitting well with us a parents and it goes against everything Angie [education minister Angie Motshekga] said, that there should be a teacher in front of the child in school. They are depriving our children of quality education and their future.”
Education department spokesperson Loyiso Pulumani had not responded to queries by the time of writing.
ziyandaz@dispatch.co.za
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