My Graced Journey: The Education crisis in South Africa and solutions

Friday 21 April 2017

The Education crisis in South Africa and solutions

The condition of Education in South Africa

A prognosis

The quality of education has regressed over the last 20 years to such an extent where we have the worst Education system and quality of Education in Africa. Census data indicates that only an estimated 48% of students who begin Grade 1 actually complete Grade 12, with most learners dropping out of school in Grade 10 and 11. According to Teachers and university professors are pass rates of 30% to 40% just too low to be of any value, globally. The national pass rate at South African state schools declined to 70.7% in 2015 (BusinessTech, 2016: online).

Zimbabwe with its unstable socio-economic and political status is ranked number 1 in Africa. How is it possible that Zimbabwe with its limited resources and unstable economic environment can outshine a so-called economic African powerhouse? Apart from the OBE curriculum policy borrowing from Australia, by the post-Apartheid government, which is intended for adult workplace skills training, and making it applicable to school education in SA, what else has gone wrong? What is the condition of education in South Africa today?

1. Lack of teacher training colleges & quality of teacher training.

The Post-Apartheid government in its wisdom decided to close all teacher training colleges, leaving the training of teachers to pure academic institutions such as universities. Universities “do not focus on the real issue, which is pedagogy, but more on the knowledge or the theory” (Maluleke, 2015: online). South Africa has a limited amount of universities, who could not carry the demand for teacher training. This leads to under-trained or even untrained teachers, especially in rural areas. The government claims that a “teacher shortage no longer exists as a result of the collaborative efforts that the government and other stakeholders have put into expanding teacher education capacity in the country. The size of teacher education in the country is now appropriate to meet its needs” (Parker, 2015: online).

However, The Centre for Development and Enterprise (CDE) released a report after conducting a quantitative study, which pointed out the following: 1. The major cause of inadequate learner achievement, is the poor subject content knowledge and pedagogical knowledge of most South African teachers; and 2. Teacher training, conducted at Higher Education Institutions is inadequate and that teachers lack essential knowledge and skills. This conclusion was also reached in a recent study by the Initial Teacher Education Research Project, an initiative of JET Education Services in collaboration with the Education Deans’ Forum and the departments of Basic Education and Higher Education and Training. “The cause of poor performance, by and large, lies not with teachers but with the teacher education system that produced them,” said the study (Nkosi, M & G, 2015: online).

2. Underpaid teachers.

National Teachers’ Union spokesman, Allen Thompson, said teachers clash with the DoE every year over poor pay. There are about 400 000 individuals nationally who work as teachers or contribute to teaching, who has to support more than 12 million pupils. A teacher with a three-year qualification takes home an annual salary of about R 155 298, while those with four-year qualifications earn about R 211 617 a year. Thompson said that it is hard for teachers to make ends meet. Senior teachers are underpaid and teachers resign because they cannot survive their lifestyle as they swim in debt. “Being an educator in South Africa means you have chosen a poor career” (Pasiya & Mtshali, in IOL news, 2016: online).

Overworked & underpaid teachers

3. Overworked teachers.

What do the teachers say about their workload? A Guardian & Mail survey conducted last year revealed the following: Of the 4,450 respondents to the Guardian teacher network and Guardian jobs survey about teachers’ lives, 82% stated that their workload was unmanageable, with two-thirds saying that expectations had increased significantly over the past five years. Furthermore, 73% of respondents said their workload was affecting their physical health and 76% their mental health. Almost a third of teachers reported that they worked more than 60 hours a week. One in five teachers said they intended to leave the profession because they felt overworked. A further 36% of teachers said they “agreed somewhat” that they wanted to leave teaching for this reason (Guardian Teacher Network, 2016: online). Julian Stanley, CEO of ESP (Education Support Partnership), states that: “Teachers have no time left for reflection. There’s more attention than ever before on children’s mental health, but there needs to be this level of support for teachers too. For many, it’s hard to reveal they’re dealing with anxiety or depression” (Guardian Teacher Network, 2016: online).

We lose good teachers to the Private sector and the education sectors abroad, especially the Middle-East who reward teachers for their effort and who do not overwork them. South African teachers are well sought after by the education sectors of other countries because of their ability to work hard, their work ethic and because they are less inclined to complain. Is it surprising though? SA teachers are brainwashed to think that it is normal to work 60 hours plus a week, to get a slave wage for it and to lose their health in the process. In KZN, for example, there are severe teacher shortages, especially in specialist subjects like science in rural areas. Teachers end up teaching subjects they have not specialized in and they are faced with multi-grading at some schools with small enrollments of about 20 to 30 pupils. Often just two teachers have to teach all pupils - from Grade R to Grade 7 (Pasiya & Mtshali, in IOL news, 2016: online).

4. Teacher bullying?

According to a study by the University of the Free State's Education faculty, is the bullying of teachers by other teachers a serious problem. A sample size of 2700 teachers, at all school levels in urban, township, informal settlements, rural and farm schools, were asked to complete a survey. The study found that about 90% of the respondents were victims of workplace bullying (WPB) by school colleagues and school management during the 12 months prior to the study. The bullying acts included direct shunning, untrue things said about them, verbal abuse, threats and ridicule, insults and teasing, damaging of possessions, as well as physical violence. Research on WPB in occupations identified teaching as a high-risk job (De Wet, in Health24, 2014: online).

5. Toxic school environment

"South African teachers are working in toxic environments characterized by disgruntled, overworked and stressed teachers" (Jacobs, in Health24, 2014: online). Jacobs said that teachers worked in "toxic" environments characterized by high levels of pupil-on-pupil and pupil-on-teacher violence and bullying. Some school communities were also fraught with moral degradation, racial conflict, violence, lawlessness, and economic despair. "In schools where despair and disrespect prevail, teachers often turn on one another" (Jacobs, in Health24, 2014: online). The report suggested that teachers were emotionally destroying one another, rather than collaborating for the greater good. (Health24, 2014: online).

6. Teacher per child ratio and oversized classes.

The maximum teacher to child ratio in Britain is 1:30. The DoE has aimed for this standard since 1994, but has failed. In South Africa, applies this ratio only to either expensive private schools or Quintile 4 & 5 public schools. South Africa’s largest private schools operator, Curro Holdings, has approximately one teacher for every 15 pupils across its network of 110 schools (BusinessTech, 2016: online). The school fees for private schools range between R 50 000 – R 254 000 per annum (Hilton College). Paying a quarter million Rand per annum for school fees alone. That is more than what most teachers earn in a year. Realistically, how many parents in SA can afford these fees? How many school teachers can enroll their own children into these schools? The problem is that these schools are a drop in the bucket compared to the thousands of poor public and rural no-fee schools that make up the majority of schools in South Africa. Private schools still only make up less than 5% of all schools in South Africa, with just over 500,000 students enrolled out of a total learner population of 12.4 million (BusinessTech, 2016: online). It’s not unheard of that some teachers have 60 pupils in their classroom. This state of affairs is severely unmanageable and the quality of education that occurs within that setting is highly questionable.

High teacher per learner ratio

7. Corruption within the DoE and schools & the misappropriation of funds.

According to a report by Corruption Watch, a civil society watchdog, are school principals the main culprits of corruption in schools, with embezzlement of school funds the most common illegal practice (Roane, 2013: online). The misuse of school funds or assets, favouritism in the appointment of staff (including the appointment of unqualified teachers to posts) and corruption in the procurement processes by school governing bodies, are among some of the complaints reported to the EELC (Equal Education Law Centre, a public interest law firm, supporting struggles for equality and equity in the education system) (Rinquest, 2015: online).

The Corruption Watch report furthermore reveals that corruption in the education sector extends beyond the scope of schools alone, it also involves corruption in Provincial Education Departments, Higher Education Institutions and Further Education Institutions. (Roane, 2013: online). This culture of corruption also seeps through to learners, with the National Senior Certificate results often being overshadowed by allegations of bribery by students in some provinces. Allegations of corruption in the Eastern Cape Department of Education, in particular, are infamous. There are reports of a lack of post provisioning in poor, rural schools and a shortage of resources to provide for the needs of learners. Recently, whistle-blowers and teacher organizations in the Queenstown District have even complained of theft and corruption in the administration of the School Nutrition Programme (Rinquest, 2015: online).

What is the cure for the ailments of the South African education system?

More parents are seeking better education alternatives for their children as the country’s basic education system ranks among the worst in the world. In South Africa, there is a booming Home-Schooling movement to address these problems. Parents have lost their trust in the public school system by large. Those who have a choice due to financial means enroll their children in private schools. Those who do not, try a middle ground, home-schooling, an improvement on the public school system. There are many arguments for home-schooling. In my opinion, Homeschooling excludes children from the necessary social development they can only acquire through being part of a school community. There are however community home-schools where there are enough children to provide this social nurturing. These community schools are most probably the perfect hybrid between individual homeschooling and a normal school set-up. Social interaction and nurturing may continue whilst high academic standards may be controlled and maintained. The question is where does tutoring fit in?

Tutoring as a solution

Home schools actually use the terminology ‘tutoring’ instead of teaching. Simply because class sizes are very small and the traditional role of the teacher teaching is altered to a teacher being more of a facilitator who has to guide and assist the learner, who has to take charge of his or her own learning.

Tutoring in the traditional sense is a one-on-one session between a tutor (a subject matter expert) and a learner/student/adult who either needs extra help with a subject, because he or she struggles with it, or who wants to learn and/or improve a language or a skill.

In South Africa the schooling of children, as explained before, lack the proper standards, which makes tutoring an essential tool to fill the gap, left by the system. Parents no longer have the choice, but to find alternative ways to patch up the holes. Tutoring is no longer a luxury, but essential for school learners in South Africa. Albeit, an expensive service for many, it has become a necessity.

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