It’s old school, and it works well at Benoni High
BENONI High School has resources – its R14 000-a-year fees mean there are double the Department of Education’s allocated 50 teachers on the staff.
At the back of the campus is a gym with weight equipment, and lush green grass surrounds the rose beds.
This high-achieving government school has enjoyed a 100 percent pass rate for 38 years – a possible record for Gauteng schools that would be easy to put down to resources.
But the secret to this school excelling goes well beyond that.
It’s in the conviction on the teachers’ faces; the pages of planning for 2012, already neatly bound; and the happy chatter of a headmaster who talks about his pupils with the radiance of a proud dad.
Somehow, Jake Ceronio’s school manages to combine a family-like environment with extremely strict discipline. The headmaster, who has been at the school since 1992, is not afraid to say his school is “old school”.
Pupils must be neatly turned out at all times, a barber visits the school to trim pupils’ hair, and blazers are frequently worn. Pupils must ask for permission before going to the toilet, and must greet all adults on campus.
“They are children and we treat them as children, which they need,” says Alison Knoop, the life sciences teacher.
Ceronio doesn’t just believe in firm punishment – he also believes in determined encouragement. The school offers 22 extramural activities, and it is compulsory to participate in at least one – whether it be cultural or sports.
Big sports matches are compulsory for all the school’s 1 600 pupils, and Ceronio pushes for the teams to do well.
But he insists that his focus on winning has nothing to do with winning – it’s all about pride and keeping your head high.
“Children who go to this school leave knowing they are as good as everybody else,” he says.
The pupil who Ceronio has been the proudest of in the past few years was not an all-a student.
“The achievers will always achieve if they put some work in,” he says.
One of the school’s most-celebrated pupils was a young man who attended the school despite having an IQ of 88 and slight physical disabilities. He was not expected to make it past Grade 8, but every year he worked extremely hard and scraped through.
When he reached matric, his mother came to see Ceronio.
She didn’t want her son to write matric in case he ruined the school’s perfect pass rate. But the school insisted he write, and he achieved his matric.
“It’s times like that that make the entire year worth it,” he says.
“I’m passionate about teaching, but I’m also passionate about those children who are left behind,” he says.
“They shouldn’t be. We have a collective responsibility.”
Ceronio’s proposed solution is a mentoring programme involving high-achieving and low-achieving schools. Headmasters and teachers from schools could do exchanges in which they share ideas and implement systems that work in their own school into schools that are suffering.
“You have to fix problems in schools from the top, you can’t fix from the bottom. The children can’t be expected to fix the school,” he insists.