A teaching degree opens many doors
Some have a calling to work in schools, but there are myriad career options for BEd graduates
Passion and dedication are the attributes of a teacher. Seeing the spark of understanding light up someone’s eyes, seeing them achieve beyond their dreams, helping them to achieve success as they find their way in life and knowing you have had a part in this — that is the experience and wish of every teacher.
At least one in every 25 matriculants has such a dream, and should study to be a teacher. To get there, accredited and fully recognised qualifications and studies are necessary.
The bachelor of education degree (BEd) is the best path to becoming a fully qualified and professionally registered teacher for the student who knows that he or she passionately wants to teach. The degree is designed to match the four major school phases: the foundation phase (grades R to three), the intermediate phase (grades four to six), and the senior and further education and training phases (grades seven to 12).
It is said by many that the foundation phase is most attractive to the teacher who loves to be with younger children, watching and helping them develop in the formative time of most rapid growth and learning.
This phase of study is most strongly directed towards t he child, with mathematics, numbers and shapes taught through enjoyable play, touching and drawing. Life skills such as hygiene and health, and home language learning, also form part of this phase.
All teachers must be able to teach home languages, and the BEd at the University of Pretoria (UP) develops these skills in an indigenous African language (Sepedi, Setswana, isiZulu and isiNdebele), as well as English and Afrikaans, including English as a first additional language. Although English and Afrikaans teaching are taught in the faculty itself, the department of African languages provides the courses for the indigenous African languages.
The intermediate phase allows a teacher to specialise in specific subjects, but the development and remedial needs of the child remain. Every intermediate phase teacher is a language specialist, teaching a home language and English.
These teachers may study to be specialists in mathematics, science and technology, and social sciences, but all are language and life skills teachers. The languages and social sciences courses are provided by specialist departments, and maths and science and technology are presented in the faculty of education.
At the senior and further education and training phases, UP offers the widest range of subjects accredited for teaching, with most specialised subjects taught by specialised departments. So maths is done in the department of mathematics, with the bachelor of science (BSc) students — similarly for physics, plant sciences, economics and others.
Home languages such as English and Sepedi are taken to third year in the same class as bachelor of arts (BA) students. The creative arts, music, human movement studies and engineering graphics and design, as well as tourism and physical education, are also options. More technical specialisations will be offered soon as the range of teachers needed in South Africa grows.
The way the specialised departments present the courses allows BEd teachers to continue with a BSc (honours) or BA (honours) in their specialisations. It is not that exceptional a vision that high school teachers may earn master’s and doctoral degrees in their specialised fields — and be scientists and researchers, contributing to new knowledge.
UP’s student teachers experience actual school teaching from their second year onwards, finally spending 14 weeks in schools in Pretoria and around South Africa in their fourth and final year.
The university’s teachers are rated as the most easily employed of all of South Africa’s universities. Well prepared professionally, and recognised as having in-depth subject knowledge, they are adaptable, able to extend their knowledge to cope with changing curricula and societal needs, creative and confident.
Teachers of all phases can specialise in their subjects, their profession and the discipline of education through further degrees such as the BEd (honours), followed by master’s and doctoral degrees.
The BEd is also a path for the student who is interested in a career that involves people, because it helps them understand how people learn, develop and achieve their potential while specialising in fields of knowledge that are valued in society.
With the BEd degree, one need not build a career only in schools, but also have the option of following up with one’s specialised knowledge to the highest levels. A graduate can be involved in developing knowledge and learning in many contexts — in companies or in one’s own enterprise or business.
A gifted student who studies psychology alongside the BEd can specialise as an educational psychologist and, after completing a master’s degree, can have a career in counselling, diagnosis and psychological treatment. The balance of specialised knowledge in education and learning, as a subject specialist, is a path to many later careers.
UP offers the BEd degree at its multicultural Groenkloof campus, which has modern communications tech- nology and is a safe, spacious and conducive environment for learning, with one of South Africa’s best libraries. The campus offers music and choirs, successful sports teams, a gymnasium and a swimming pool, and football, rugby and athletics fields that provide the opportunity for healthy social and physical growth. Students can easily make friends and find interesting activities in a cohort that is dedicated to learning with and through all cultures.
The Groenkloof campus is home to more than 3 500 BEd students and, from this group, well over 800 graduates enter the teaching profession every year.
It is clear that education is the priority in a country in which some studies have shown that only 7% of matriculants enter public higher education, 12% enter other forms of further and higher education, 30% acquire a job and 51% of young people are unemployed.
The faculty of education is ranked in the top 200 in the world on the QS World University rankings; it is rated as the top educational faculty in South Africa in terms of the number of National Research Foundationrated researchers it has produced. The faculty is internationally recognised for its academic reputation, employer reputation and citations of research. Its BEd finds its strength in its partnership with leading specialised departments and faculties.
We live in a time in which the ageold principles of effective education have become even more crucial to progress and development — and our graduates play an essential role in this respect.
The faculty of education is the place of choice for those with a passion for learning who want to enter the teaching profession.