Quality problem remains in examination results

TEACHERS’ union Naptosa predicts that the overall percentage of matriculants who have passed will be higher than last year, but education experts say South Africa still faces a quality problem.

The overall and provincial pass marks will be released this evening and matriculants will receive their individual results tomorrow.

Umalusi, the body which standardises results, has already said the 2016 maths and maths literacy results are very poor.

Maths literacy is the easier of the two subjects.

Naptosa executive director Basil Manuel said the union was expecting a slight increase in the percentage of matrics who passed in 2016, up from 70.7% in 2015.

“A large increase would be suspicious. We predict a slight increase in pass mark results, but Naptosa still believes the quality of passes is what really matters.”

For a matric pass mark, a candidate must have 40% and above for two subjects and their home language and 30% or above for the three others.

University of the Witwatersrand education professor Elizabeth Walton said: “To just talk about the pass rate, I don’t think we’re learning an awful lot about the system reporting [results] at that level.

“It doesn’t really tell us how we could be improving the system.

“Far more useful questions [to ask] are about subjects in particular.”

Umalusi said last week mathematical literacy was one area where “learner performance is critically low” and had been since 2014.

Manuel said the issue should be investigated, saying that about seven years ago, 70% of those who wrote the maths literacy exam had passed, but this had dropped to 35%. “It is a worrisome decline.” Umalusi said maths had also been a problem over the years.

In 2015, about 25% of pupils who wrote matric (just under 130 000) passed mathematics, but only 31.9% of those who passed got above 49% for maths.

Wits University maths education lecturer Jacques du Plessis said teachers needed to have better content knowledge and know how to teach that content properly.

“Teachers feel battered and bruised. They need to be upskilled and supported.”

Walton said the poor pupil performance in mathematics and mathematical literacy was nothing new, but a reminder of the subject’s horrific legacy. “There aren’t any quick fixes. “We need incremental improvement in the lower grades year to year,” she said.

“We need interventions in the foundation and intermediate phases. We can’t pick up problems in Grade 9 and then expect results.”