Africa, Development & Aid, Education, Headlines, Human Rights, Poverty & SDGs

EDUCATION-SOUTH AFRICA: ‘We Need All Hands on Deck to Solve The Crisis’

Interview with Graeme Bloch of the Development Bank of South Africa

CAPE TOWN, Jan 29 2008 (IPS) - Teachers who are not trained properly, teacher strikes and HIV/AIDS are taking a huge toll on the educational system in South Africa.

“Thousands of children leave our schools without the foundation skills to enable them to enter further study programmes or to obtain skilled jobs,” says Graeme Bloch, an education specialist at the Development Bank of South Africa.

“If we all make education our priority, we may start to address the problem,” Bloch stresses. IPS Correspondent Stephanie Nieuwoudt spoke to Bloch about what can be done.

IPS: Is the current system of different provinces with each having its own education policy constructive to the goals for education in the country?

Graeme Bloch: I believe that the country needs much tighter national control. The national department of education should not only be the body that makes policy, if it is constitutionally viable, there should be one department of education only. But there should be room for provincial specific programmes.

Poverty is often blamed for bad results, yet some schools in remote parts of the country sometimes manage wonderful pass rates. Success is dependent on the individual at the helm of the school. There is a principal in one of these areas, who has drawn the community to the school. He has members of the community involved in schemes which generate money for the school and the community. This principal is organised – to the benefit of not only the community but also the school.

The problems experienced by the schools in the different provinces, are reflected in the performance rates. In KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga, Limpopo, and the Eastern Cape, the performances are worse. The middle band lies in Northwest, Free State while the best performances are in Gauteng, Northern Cape and the Western Cape.

One cannot put all of the blame on the education departments for terrible year-end results. Last year teachers countrywide went on strike for a month. The casualties were the children.

The education crisis can be addressed if the whole of society gets behind the department of education… Teachers should be supported by government. They should be given textbooks and other materials needed for teaching. And these things should be there when schools re-open at the beginning of each year.

IPS: There is a huge problem with inadequately trained teachers and the Outcomes Based Education (OBE) system has been criticised.

GB: We certainly have to re-evaluate the way that teachers are trained. There is finally acknowledgment that the OBE system was far too ambitious when it was implemented in early 2000… Although standards which demand a lot from both students and teachers are good, it has to be implemented in a structure where teacher support is excellent. We simply do not have that in this country.

OBE focuses on the development of critical thinking and it demands that the student does a lot of work himself. OBE is near impossible to implement in an area where there are no textbooks, no photocopying machines, libraries or other facilities to aid the teaching process.

IPS: The dropout rate of primary school children is high. How does one address this?

GB: It is difficult to address in a country where children often have to cross flooded rivers, where there is no adequate transportation system, where they go to school on empty bellies, and where many of them are the heads of households where parents have died due to AIDS.

There is also the language issue. It has been established that children who are taught in their mother tongue, perform better at school. Government has made a start in developing materials in different languages. However, the problem is that many teachers themselves may not be proficient in the specific languages.

Children in poorer areas are also exempt from paying school fees. However, this system is being rolled out over a number of years and it will take some time before it reaches all needy children. There is a lot of criticism from people who say that free education in this country is too costly for the government.

IPS: How good is morale amongst teachers after the strikes last year?

GB: The unions and the departments – provincial and national – are playing blame games. There are bad relations between teachers and the authorities. If you are focusing on blaming something or someone, teaching falls by the wayside.

The unions are not doing much talking about raising the professional standards of teachers. While morale is low, students are not inspired to study or to enter the profession themselves.

IPS: Establishing a good foundation when the child enters school, assures success later in life. We have in the past failed to provide a sound basis. What is being done right now at the lower grade levels?

GB: The government is busy implementing a roll out plan for Grade R (Reception). In this pre-school grade the focus is on child development and play. But once again, there are problems with teachers not being adequately trained for teaching at this level.

It is extremely important to get young children accustomed to the discipline of learning even if it happens at a very informal level. We need to give them positive role models – something which most rural children do not have as they are left in the care of grandparents while the parents work in the cities.

Fiscally, there has been a huge emphasis on the education budget. Around 6 percent of the Gross Domestic Product and around 21 percent of the national budget have been targeted towards education.

IPS: Why do you think we have not yet managed to reach a point where there is a shared national vision to address inequality in the system?

GB: I think we failed as a nation to prioritise education. There is no common vision and set of priorities so we can all pull together and contribute in different ways to make things work. It is not just up to government but a case of ‘all hands on deck’ to solve the education crisis.

At many of the old Model C [white] schools the schools governing bodies (SGBs) have been able to raise substantial private funds and skills to improve education, which has lead to some accusations that it leads to the maintenance of privilege and restricted access.