South African schools that are underperforming, particularly in rural areas, are entrenched in dysfunction with little to no resource allocation and are ill-supported to provide children with opportunities to excel academically, says The Equal Education Law Centre (EELC).
EELC says school governing bodies should have the power to hold underperforming schools accountable.
Shortage of study material, poverty and violence are some of the main issues that are plaguing South African schools. While those dire conditions affect the performance of teachers and pupils, they are hardly taken to consideration when trying to find ways to support underperforming schools.
Earlier this year, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga announced the matric pass rate for 2021 to be 71.4%; however, it has been speculated that the number is far lower as the results do not consider the dropout rate.
The EELC reported that in contemporary South Africa, approximately 80% of high schools are ‘dysfunctional’. These schools predominantly serve black and coloured pupils,” it said.
To address the dysfunction across schools, the group recommends that the parents and the school governing body should hold the underperforming schools to account. The EELC said:
- The Department of Basic Education must, in an annual report in terms of section 8 of the National Education Policy Act, reveal the steps it has taken to support underperforming schools.
- Governing bodies should be trained and capacitated to provide effective school oversight.
- Regulations be adjusted to enable local level oversight as the South African Schools Act, and the National Education Policy Act only offer mechanisms for oversight at a ministerial level.
- Parents be supplied with information to allow them to hold the school to account in the form of expanded reports detailing the functioning of the school.
- Parents must have access to information regarding enrolment numbers and teacher turnover, both in absolute terms and in comparison, with other schools in the district.
- Legislation must set minimum requirements for school reports to parents and ensure that they are set out in recommended norms and standards.
The EELC argues that the current regulatory framework for underperforming schools fails to give heads of departments (HOD) enough power to make necessary changes.
Source: New24, Business Tech, image from Twitter