Feet First No easy walk to education for SA kids
| The vast majority of our children have to walk to school, and their way is often tiring and paved with danger
IF you drop your child off at school or they drive there in their own car, consider them extremely lucky — they are among just 9.6% of South African pupils who get to school that way.
The vast majority of the country’s pupils walk to school, and some, particularly in rural areas, spend more than an hour trekking to class. Two separate Stats SA reports reveal that nearly seven out of every 10 pupils walk to school. Among them are more than a million preschoolers.
Stats SA’s General Household Survey, released at the end of May, showed that of the approximately 15 million schoolgoing pupils in South Africa, only 1.47 million use their “own car or other private vehicle” to get to class. This figure pales in comparison to the 10.52 million (68.4%) who have to walk. About 1.57 million use a taxi or bus and 109 000 take a train, the survey found.
Just 294 000 (1.9%) use transport paid for by the state. The Department of Basic Education said it simply did not have the money to cater for all those children who qualify.
“There is not enough money to cater for everyone. The department works within limited funds and the demand for education is increasing,” said spokesman Elijah Mhlanga.
Another survey, the Stats SA National Household Travel Survey, found that KwaZulu-Natal, the Eastern Cape and Limpopo had the most pupils who walked to school.
The survey also found the situation has worsened and more pupils were walking for longer than an hour to get to school in 2013 than was the case in 2003.
According to the survey, 517 000 pupils walked for more than an hour to get to school. The majority (more than six million) walked for less than half an hour, while just more than two million walked for between 30 minutes and an hour.
“Transport makes it possible for educational institutions to be accessible to attendees . . . it is important that it is affordable, easily accessible and safe for everyone,” said Stats SA.
In September last year, the South African Human Rights Commission finalised a report on scholar transport in the East- ern Cape. It found that the provincial education department had violated pupils’ right to basic education by not providing them with subsidised transport to and from school.
The investigation, which focused on six schools, found that pupil transport “was not adequate and in some instances nonexistent”.
This week, the Legal Resources Centre and the Eastern Cape education department squared off in the High Court in Grahamstown as four schools demanded transport for more than 200 pupils who walk at least 5km to get to school.
In court papers, the schools’ governing bodies and parents state that, apart from the walks being long, their children face a multitude of dangers — with incidents of muggings and sexual assaults having been reported. The department argued that many of the pupils did not qualify for government transport because they were not attending the nearest school — and were therefore electing to walk the long distances.
The departments of transport and education have formulated an updated “draft national learner transport policy”, which was presented to parliament last month. Mhlanga said the policy was likely to be in place in the current financial year and was aimed at ensuring that those who qualified and needed transport received it (see accompanying story on this page).
But while it is being finalised, education experts said, pupils would continue to suffer.
“The impact is that kids arrive late. And if it’s raining or cold, they might skip school completely,” said education specialist Graeme Bloch. Comment on this: write to tellus@sundaytimes.co.za or SMS us at 33971 www.timeslive.co.za
GREAT TREK: Nine-year-old Bheko Thusini prepares for school, below, before setting out on the 3km walk to school
The impact is that kids arrive late. And if it’s raining or cold, they might skip school completely