Belated honours for top Nkwanca matric
NKWANCA High School Grade 12 pupil Anathi Mazamisa, family and friends are in celebratory mood after the young man achieved a spectacular 100% in both maths and science in the 2017 matric exams.
While he is definitely among the top achievers in the district – and the province – he was erroneously not invited to the gala dinner to honour top achievers – probably due to the fact that the marks for agricultural sciences for 33 pupils at the school were received late.
Mazamisa’s other marks included 97% for life sciences, 93% for life orientation, 87% for English and 86% for isiXhosa. He was belatedly honoured by the department during a function in Zwelitsha in King William’s Town on Sunday.
The 33 pupils had found that the marks for agricultural sciences had been omitted from their academic transcripts, apparently due to a departmental blunder.
Principal Ntsikelelo Lutseke said the issue had affected the school and pupils.
“I am happy to announce that the situation is being taken care of and I am proud that the school did very well. Last year we achieved a 68% pass rate and this year we got 69.1%.
“We still need to improve in mathematics, accounting and business studies because pupils are failing these learning areas from early grades. The education department’s policy requires schools to ‘push’ learners to the next grade even if they are failing and that negatively affects our pass rate.
“To ensure an improvement for this year’s matrics, we are starting extra classes on January 22.”
Mazamisa will be studying mechatronic engineering at the University of the Western Cape.
“I am relieved that this matter is being fixed, but my school mates are still struggling to get placements at universities because they could not submit their academic transcripts in time due to the outstanding marks. They are now treated as having applied late and it is difficult to secure a place at this time of the year.”
The school had 37 bachelor passes, 44 diploma and 31 higher certificate passes.
Education director in Chris Hani West Nkosinathi Godlo said the results blunder was as a result of a programme error.
“We were told by the provincial department that the error occurred because the system initially would not allow for corrections and adjustments to be made. We apologise to the affected pupils and will ensure this incident does not happen again.”