Speech by Comrade Thobile Ntola, President of SADTU at the “1 Goal Campaign: Education for All” march at Constitution Hill, Johannesburg.

10 June 2010

Comrades allow me to greet you on behalf of the leadership of the South African Democratic Teachers Union and our quarter of a million members. As a union we are committed to the ‘1 Goal Campaign’ – which also reflects the call of the 1956 Freedom Charter for free and equal education for all.

We are marching today to draw attention to the plight of millions of children around the world who are excluded from education and to call on world leaders attending the Education Summit announced by President Zuma to meet their obligations and to commit to implementing education for all.

We are marching on the eve of the FIFA World Cup – a momentous occasion for South Africa and the continent. But there is also a connection to our campaign here today. It is with shame that we have to say that in the majority of our schools currently there is no visible physical education and sports programme. In 1994 we used to talk about leveling the playing fields in education – meaning giving equal resources in all schools. In fact most schools do not have proper playing fields.

Yet we wonder why Bafana Bafana has struggled in recent years – we need to learn the lesson that football and sports development starts in the schools. And this topic is much more important than what happens to our national team – we are talking about our learners’ right to a holistic education – which must include physical education.

I want to deal with two issues briefly today:

• Access to education in South Africa, and
• The quality education in South Africa – and I particularly want to speak about the teachers contribution to improving quality.

I. Access

There has been a certain complacency in regard to access to education in this country. The official figures indicate near-universal attendance. But below the surface, research indicates that there is some cause for concern. Let me list some of the concerns:

• Drop out rates

In regard to drop out rates and children out of school, the recent findings of the Social Surveys Africa and CALS (Centre for Applied Legal Studies) Access to Education Project conclude as follows:

• 3.4% of children are out of school at any one time
• This figure rises to 9.8% for the age group 16 to 18
• 4.2% of children have missed school for a year or more

The survey findings indicate specific groups that are vulnerable to dropping out of school, including:

• Youths living on farms, especially coloured youth
• Children with some form of disability
• Children from poverty stricken households including informal settlements

We need much more research into the specific conditions of these vulnerable groups, but already it is clear that children with disabilities are not being adequately catered for.

SADTU is very concerned that the issue of inclusive education has simply fallen off the agenda. It seems that little has been done to implement the policy recommendations of White Paper Six. The policy shift to inclusive education meant that little new investment has gone into the special needs schools, whilst there has been little move towards implementing inclusive education in the mainstream public schools.

A case in point is proposals from the Department to revise the Post Provisioning Model. Whilst the new model claims to be more equitable, the new model completely ignores special needs, and is silent on appropriate staffing ratios for learners with special needs.

There are also additional financial barriers to access beyond school fees. The cost of school uniform, shoes etc, additional charges for books, school trips etc, transport and ‘voluntary’ school fund contributions are all disincentives to school attendance for poor learners.

Like learners with barriers to learning, homeless children and orphans require levels of support that are different from other learners.  Identifying the levels of support is important.  To provide this support we require partnerships with appropriate agencies and departments.
 
Access to, and the quality of, education is still greatly influenced by geographic location and resources.

Transport and provisions of hostels have been identified as solutions to allow youth on farms to attend secondary schools at some distance from home. However, it essential to carefully monitor the conditions at hostel schools to prevent possible abuse.

• Throughput rates (repetition rates)

The same CALS/Social Survey Africa report found in relation to repetition rates the following:

• By the FET phase 51.5% of learners had repeated a year; of these 9% had repeated three or more times. This puts massive pressure on the system, is highly costly and results in overcrowding and an undesirable spread of ages within a given grade.

The following groups are particularly vulnerable to repeating:

• Learners living in traditional rural areas
• Children of less educated parents
• Black children (6 times more likely to repeat than whites)
• Children with disabilities
• Children who do not have English as a home language.

• Language policy – another barrier to access

The Social Surveys Africa and CALS report shows that home language is an indicator of children likely to repeat a year. Whilst less than 12% of children with English as a home language repeat, 41% of those with Sepedi as a home language end up repeating.

Our language policy is in crisis: many of our children are forced to learn in a second language which they hardly comprehend. This prevents or delays cognitive development across all learning areas. Many of our teachers are also teaching in a second or third language – for which they were not trained and receive little support. The resulting confusion is a real barrier to quality learning and teaching and is reflected in poor outcomes.

 
II. Quality

Whilst we can never be complacent as long as any child is excluded from school, in South Africa today I believe that our most important task is to improve the quality of education delivery. This is why as teacher unions we have agreed to partner with the Department of Education and other stakeholders in the Quality Learning and Teaching Campaign.

Our poor performance in international literacy and numeracy tests indicates a deep-rooted problem in the system. The background and reasons for the lack of quality are well known, including:

• High levels of inequality and poverty - The Department’s study evaluating the implementation and impact of the NNSSF (National Norms & Standards for Schools Funding) indicates the range of inequality between the wealthiest 10% of schools, which if anything are over-resourced, and the rest of the schooling system. The richer quintiles spend extra on personnel whilst parents pay for books. Poorer schools are using some of the non-personnel funding to pay for support staff which reflects the inequality in distribution of support staff.

Currently, we have a funding system for public education which does little to redress inherited inequalities and has allowed a semi-private fee paying system to emerge within the public system. The fee paying schools are subsidized by the state but essentially serve the middle class.

• Poor infrastructure and lack of learning materials – most schools do not have libraries or laboratories, and many still do not have electricity, water or sanitation.

• Poor management – in total crisis, in the case of Eastern Cape.

• Poorly trained teachers – it is only now for the first time that we have started to develop a national plan for teacher development.

• Massive curriculum change – which has been largely mismanaged resulting in general confusion.

• Unmanageable class sizes – especially in the poorest and rural schools.

This is why I believe that the QLTC is so important. In the past when poor results were announced we would simply blame each other for the poor outcomes. The premise of the QLTC is different: we say that we must all be jointly accountable for the quality of education delivery whilst identifying our individual tasks and responsibilities.

In the case of teachers we say “teachers must be on time, on task, well prepared and professionally behaved at all times.” Similarly the Department’s job is to ensure basic infrastructure and learning materials and to facilitate the training, development and support of teachers. Communities and parents are called on to support their local schools, participate in SGBs, ensure the security of the school building and ensure that learners are disciplined in doing their schoolwork. Most important, the learners must develop and maintain a code of conduct. In other words we are saying that improving education is a task that requires input and participation from the entire society if it is to succeed.

Teacher development and support

In line with the goals of the QLTC, as SADTU we believe that it is absolutely vital to put in place a national plan for teacher development.

As SADTU we believe strongly that well-trained and motivated educators are key to the delivery of quality education. So we need teacher development to bring the teachers up to speed in terms of the basic knowledge and practice, and to be able to handle new curricula and new policies.

Beyond this, looking forward, we also seek to instill commitment to the notion of life-long learning. In the new knowledge economy with its constantly changing educational demands, it is vital that the teachers keep learning, keep developing.

In the light of this we have to commend the Department for working with teacher unions and other stakeholders to organise the Teacher Development Summit last year and to drive the subsequent research process to develop concrete strategies and plans for teacher development.

As things stand we have too many poorly trained educators, contributing to poor learner outcomes and a negative image in the community, resulting in demoralization and low self-esteem – a vicious cycle.

What we want is to achieve a virtuous cycle:

• This starts with the identification of teachers’ development needs to improve teaching in the classroom;

• We then need to facilitate development opportunities for educators with the objective of improving teaching and hence improving learner outcomes;

• This will improve the image of teachers and their own self-esteem – so that we start producing educators who take responsibility for their own professional development. This can only benefit the learners.

In closing, I want to emphasise the point that as we achieve education for all we need to start asking questions about the nature of that education and how we can improve quality and ensure an equal chance for every learner to receive a holistic education which benefits the learner and builds a strong and caring society.

I thank you.