‘Shake-up’ won’t fix problems
Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga has announced a “shake-up” in education that comprises recommendations that would see the incorporation of national exit examinations (General Education Certificate – GEC) for grade 9s.
This announcement was made at the Sadtu (South African Democratic Teachers Union) elective conference on September 26 2019.
This recommendation may be introduced as from 2020.
The impression is being created that this is a new, innovative and progressive development in the basic education system.
Is this, however, not just a case of old wine in new bottles?
The Education Renewal Strategy (ERS – released in 1991) of the Nationalist Party introduced the concept of grade 9 being an exit point as part of their education package to assist the nationalists with the negotiations in the constitutional process.
In this, ATM’s Mzwanele Manyi is correct in that the whole process, not dissimilar from the ANC’s Education Policy Review, is the basis for the education negotiation process.
It now seems the old wine has intoxicated us, as we tend to overlook what really transpired.
Surely, our demands weren’t met during the horse deals at Kempton Park.
Moreover, we’ve had a couple of grade 9 exit plans over the last three decades.
Every government since the notorious Eiselen and De Vos Malan Commissions of 1951 spelt out the role of schooling in preparing the child of the oppressed for their subservient role in society.
The De Lange Commission that was set up after the 1976 revolts also adopted this same standpoint.
The sentiment expressed by previous governments, as well as the present minister, is that our children should be “werkgereed”.
While the current plans are not accompanied by racial discrimination, the poor suffer under a destructive social system of class discriminatory education.
Already plans are in progress allowing industrialists and capitalists to buy-in to finance this scheme.
Most business organisations and government recognise SA suffers from a shortage of skills, including artisans, technicians and engineers.
Is this geared to assist the employers to engage cheap labour units?
Other challenges are poor student throughput rates.
The 2018 throughput rate according to the grade 1 cohort of 2007, is 33.8%. This adds significantly to the 55.2% youth unemployment rate.
Surely, this is set to increase when the school exit level is pegged at grade 9.
Are we to accept that industrialists and capitalists are to determine our school system?
There was a strong emphasis on vocational education (as at present) in the ERS and non-formal education and child labour.
The majority of our pupils in the townships will again be subjected to what was called “colouredised” and “Batuised” education.
The motivation at the time seemed to indicate that there was an over-emphasis on the academic to the exclusion of training.
To this end, minister [Sibusisu] Bhengu in 1997 presented proposals for the complete overhaul of education in the National Qualification Framework guidelines that revealed similar goals.
In 2008, minister Naledi Pandor again raised the matter of the grade 9 exit point when she announced in August in what at that time was described as a “radical move”, that an additional exit point would be created.
Their main aim now is to find a way to manage the matriculation pass rate.
With numbers of pupils “out of the way”, the pass rate will increase, while the dropout rate will decrease.
This will, however, not address the problems so evident in education, nor will it address the problems as regards the quality of our teaching.
There’s no gainsaying the fact that the quality of an education system cannot exceed the quality of its teachers.
Coming from a weak academic base, there’s no doubt that the TVET Colleges leave much to be desired.
Many of these colleges in the past did not even submit results to the authorities.
Further, many of the lecturers are ill-equipped for the positions they occupy, with no teachers’ qualifications and very little experience, even at management level.
The question to ask is will this resolve the education crisis?
To education observers, this is tantamount to closing school doors, as is being done in many parts of the country.
To educationalists, it appears that closing the doors of schools, as in the case of the grade 9 debacle is indistinguishable from opening prison doors.
What is needed?
Our goal should be to provide free education for everyone from pre-primary to university.
Surely, equity and justice for everyone has to be built from the bottom up.
There is no way that pupils can flourish in townships, with inadequate housing and everything that accompanies that.
The ultimate goal of the education process is the attainment of a society that provides adequately for the nation’s physical and material needs.
We must provide quality education that will enable them to live meaningful personal lives and to contribute towards creating the kind of society that will meet the needs and aspirations of all South Africans.
Hamilton Petersen, Uitenhage