Minister plays numbers game

How results are measured provides differences in pass rate figures

WHEN Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga announced the 2016 matric results‚ she congratulated Free State for breaking the 90% threshold with its top pass rate.

But a closer inspection reveals that this is not the full story.

Last year‚ the number of progressed pupils registered for matric increased significantly. These pupils did not meet the requirements to be promoted to Grade 12 but were progressed because they had already been held back.

When Motshekga announced the results, she noted they had been compiled in two ways – including and excluding progressed pupils.

When progressed pupils are included‚ the national pass rate drops from 76.2% to 72.5%.

The provincial breakdown is: • Free State 88.2%;

• Western Cape 86%;

• Gauteng 85.1%;

• North West 82.5%;

• Northern Cape 78.7%;

• Mpumalanga 77.1%;

• KwaZulu-Natal 66.4%;

• Limpopo 62.5%;

• Eastern Cape 59.3%. Motshekga did not announce this, but instead reported the results excluding progressed pupils.

When progressed pupils are excluded‚ the Free State obtained 93.2%‚ the Western Cape 87.7%‚ Gauteng 87% and North West 86.2%. Using the same measure, the Eastern Cape pass rate rises to 63.3%.

Though the inclusion of progressed pupils pushed the national pass rate down by almost four percentage points‚ Motshekga said the progression policy had worked.

Of these progressed pupils‚ 3 335 obtained bachelor passes‚ 12 636 obtained diploma passes and 13 385 obtained higher certificate passes. Progressed pupils also achieved 2 361 distinctions‚ compared to 1 081 in 2015‚ with some of these attained in accounting‚ mathematics and physical science.

Motshekga said the significance of these achievements was that the 29 384 progressed pupils who had passed – “the would-be high school dropouts if they were not progressed”, as she described them – could now either go to university or technical and vocational training colleges.