Dumbing down education doesn’t aid women wanting to smash the ‘glass ceiling’

THE poor standard of education is hindering the dreams of many young women who aspire to be engineers.

With mathematical proficiency rated as the third worst in the world, the “education system has systematically dumbed down our children,” according to Naadiya Moosajee, civil engineer and co-founder of Women in Engineering (WomEng), an NGO engaged in developing the next generation of women engineers in 15 countries globally.

With the world geared to excellence in science, technology, engineering and maths careers, South African students are being hampered by a “below-par” education system that does not equip them to be “globally competitive”.

“The pass rates make ourselves look good on paper but in reality that has done a disservice to our children.

“This is possibly a legacy challenge where instead of raising everybody’s standards to the pre-1994 Model C levels, we lowered the modality to the lowest education levels.

“The system is outcomes-based and does not produce critical thinkers or students who are able to compete globally. Pass rates of 30% are completely unrealistic. Elsewhere in the world, the pass rate is 50% and at university it is 50%,” said Moosajee.

From WomEng’s inception 13 years ago, they have guided about 20 000 young women interested in careers in engineering. Of the 20 000 women assisted by the NGO, about 32 have returned to say they are now qualified engineers and many of these women have vol- unteered to “pay it forward” to the next generation of aspiring engineers.

Moosajee said they found themselves “bursting the bubbles” of many young women who approached WomEng in their matric year, only to be told that they needed to have studied maths and not maths literacy to gain entry to study engineering at university. Without science subjects many of the women were streamed towards Bachelor of Arts.

“We need maths and science and we need to stop with this maths literacy because it doesn’t work. It has literally done a bigger disservice to our children.

“Education is t he second- highest amount that the government spends on, after health.

“We are spending a lot of money and we’re not being smart about how we spend it. We must restructure, reprioritise and integrate some new technology and new learning methodology in our curriculum,” said Moosajee.

The leap from high school to university proved perilous for many students and globally about 60% of engineering students drop out of their courses as a result of unfamiliar academic and social challenges.

“However,” said Moosajee, “it is not an impossibility. It is not an insurmountable challenge. There are many students who come from disadvantaged backgrounds who work really hard. There are students who study part time, have to work to support their families and pay for their studies and they succeed.”

WomEng guide girls from as young as nine to women who have qualified as engin- eers. Because they do not offer bursaries, they have partnered with organisations which offer bursaries to students, said Moosajee.

Once at university, WomEng help the women find their place among a community of fellow engineering students who offer each other peer support.

Civil engineer Aditi Lachman, who began volunteering with WomEng during her second-year at university and who now runs GirlEng programmes with high school girls full time, said many pupils found maths and science boring until they were introduced to technical challenges and met women who had qualified as engineers.

The programmes showed the girls what was open and available to them and taught them to be confident about their careers choices.

It taught them not to settle for what was easier and that getting lower marks in pure maths opened more doors for them than getting high marks in maths literacy, which certainly does not qualify them for university engineering studies, said Lachman.