Education under the ANC has become a blackboard bungle
SCHOOLS that find themselves in poor economic areas in South Africa struggle to give pupils the best education possible. Schools of the rich are able to appoint school governing body teachers out of the exorbitant school fees charged, in excess of R15000 a pupil a year.
Unless the government is prepared to drastically increase funding to poor schools, most of them are going to struggle. The quality of matric passes will continue to be mediocre if we do not increase the number of teachers.
One would have thought that since the fall of apartheid in 1994, there would have been certain steps taken to improve education.
In 1996, when political activist Ganief Hendricks predicted that a large amount of teachers would be rationalised, people said it would never happen. Twenty-thousand teachers were rationalised by the new democratic government in 1996. South Africans, including Hendricks, staged one of the biggest marches in 1996, in Cape Town, opposing the massive retrenchment of teachers.
The biggest teacher union supported the retrenchment. Fortunately, the teacher union is calling on the government to appoint more teachers.
There is a dearth of teachers in most subjects, especially maths, physical science and accounting – subjects that are needed for degrees in science and commerce.
The universities and further education and training ( FET) institutions must increase their enrolment. Thousands are turned away annually because there is no space for them.
The government, schools and universities must get together seriously to sort out the huge problems in education.
When I was teaching, I would tell pupils that if they met the requirements to get into a university and they were refused, they should you let me know and I would accompany them to the university. I see most universities now want to see the student because it is easier to brush them off.
Teachers, it is our duty to see that our children receive a quality education. The doors of learning must be opened.