Motshekga acknowleges challenges
THE Basic Education Department knew last month there would be problems with school admissions in some provinces, including Gauteng, Minister Angie Motshekga said yesterday.
Sowetan reported yesterday that frustrated parents had been queuing outside district offices of the Gauteng department of education since Monday after their children had not been placed at schools through the online application system for Grade 1 and 8.
Speaking at Phehellang Secondary School in Parys, Free State, at the start of the academic year yesterday, Motshekga said all provinces were ready for the first day of school even though there were “teething problems”.
“We are as ready as we could be. There are small glitches because we have been monitoring from Monday if indeed the reports we got on Thursday are as they were. We were aware from December that Gauteng and Western Cape were going to experience major problems with admissions.
“We were aware and it has come up that parents from both provinces [Gauteng and Western Cape] are really struggling to get confirmation of their placements,” said Motshekga.
Sowetan also reported yesterday that some schools in Limpopo had reported a shortage of textbooks through lobby group, Basic Education For All.
However, Motshekga said the only problem her department was aware of was that there was going to be a late delivery of stationery in schools in the province as orders were placed late.
“[In] Limpopo we are also aware that the tender on stationery was only issued in December because of some delay with treasury, so we expect that in the first 10 days in Limpopo we will have some delays in the delivery of stationery and not of top-up [text]books. We will monitor that and see how we can support the province.
“So there are those teething problems that we were aware of in December,” she said.
Motshekga also said she would be visiting the Eastern Cape at the end of the month to monitor if the province had managed to resolve some of its problems, as a lot of things were not finalised when schools were closed last year.
She said the major one was the movement of teachers because the province had reached an agreement late in the year with unions.
“There were also difficulties with the infrastructure in the PE area, so there were a few things that we needed to tighten up.
“The new HOD [head of department] was appointed in December and he has been working out throughout the festive season.”
Motshekga was accompanied by Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa at the school which achieved 100% pass rate two years in succession.
Motshekga once again congratulated the province for “breaking the cycle” and achieving a 93.2% matric pass rate.
Without progressed pupils the province achieved 93.2% and 88.2% with progressed pupils making it the number one provin ce in matric results for last year.
She said even the “big players”, such as Gauteng and Western Cape, had not been able to achieve a 90% but have instead been hovering around 80%.
Ramaphosa also congratulated the province and said the country was expecting more from it in this year’s matric results.
“Ntate Tate [Makgoe, MEC], we are applauding you for 2017 because in 2017 we want 95% from you,” he said.