Booted out of school for speaking Xhosa?

Sixteen-year-old Luthando Nxasana was allegedly asked to leave a class at Roosevelt High in Johannesburg for speaking Xhosa. This, on the face of it, sounds scandalous and has managed to make news internationally. But it becomes less scandalous when one realises that the class she was attending was given in the medium of another language, English, and she apparently was being disruptive, and not for the first time. It becomes even less outrageous if you have taught children nearly your entire adult life, which I have had the privilege of doing. Given the level of education of the Roosevelt learners, it is common courtesy in the classroom to speak only in the medium of instruction (students have been known to pass coarse remarks about the teachers and students for the entertainment of their same-language peers). It is also common knowledge among teachers that mother-tongue speakers of other languages simply won’t stick to that rule. I’m approaching this topic as one who has taught kids most of my adult life.

Other than teaching English as a second language in a Xhosa high school for two years, I taught English in China at virtually all levels for five years, from primary school students to engineers in car factories. The rule for learners to stick to the language of instruction was a policy made clear, but often broken, especially among children. I could hear through the walls fellow, beleaguered teachers bellowing at children, “Don’t speak Chinese!” That achieves little; the kids clam up and don’t want to learn. Teachers should focus on the objective of the lesson, learning the subject matter, be it English or economics, not concentrate on what the learners shouldn’t be doing: speaking to one another in their mother tongue. By focusing most of your time on the educational topic and only sometimes reinforcing the rule of what shouldn’t be done, a lot more can be achieved. That is to say, teachers should be focusing on bringing their subject alive and asserting the targets of the lessons so the learners focus on acquiring, instead of focusing on negating or frustrating the objectives, which statements like “Don’t speak Chinese!” or “Don’t speak Xhosa!”, if often repeated and yelled, reinforce. It is a teaching style of affirmation, not frustration. And oh, that’s much easier said than done.

I have had occasion to ask students to leave my class if they are disruptive. And large students who refused to? Well, I helped them re-discover the ambulatory marvel of their legs by propelling them out, and I returned to a class more than happy to get back to affirmation of the class subject, rather than frustration of it. Never did my punitive actions result in a scandal, and it is from this perspective that I argue that the Roosevelt school case should not have become a public outrage, and, in contradiction, that it is good that it has made the news.

It was the level of disruption that came with the breaking of the courtesy rule to stick to the language of instruction that Roosevelt High asserts was the reason for asking Luthando Nxasana to leave the class. Criticise this if you are not a teacher, but with the following caveat: You don’t know what you are talking about. It is a demanding job and only those who have taught (especially large classes) can truly appreciate that telling a rude student “to get out of my class” is fair on all the other learners who want a peaceful educational setting. That’s what their parents have paid for and that’s why the learners are there, not to have a spat about the use of other languages in another language-medium classroom.

Which brings us to the issue of the language that was used by the learner. What if it were not Xhosa? What if the language was Greek used by a Greek student at Roosevelt High? It wouldn’t have become a scandal being reported around the world. So what is the scandal? At face value it appears that a Xhosa speaker has certain current rights, due to historical wrongs that our hypothetical Greek student would not have. If we keep on obscuring and confusing the real issues, such as education and school discipline, with the wrongs of the past we can hardly forge a worthwhile future.

Obscuring the issues, mixed message
I have said it is important that the Roosevelt case becomes news. It is highlighting inevitable, enormous tensions as the underprivileged and privileged kinds of education continue to conflate and collide in countries like South Africa. Some students understandably resent being forced into a strange cultural setting and face being alienated from their peers in their own community who do not have the same “educational privilege”. The Nxasana family is alleging that their daughter being kicked out a class was only one in a long line of grievances, and that all were done in the name of racism and intimidation: Luthando, along with her twin sister, have supposed grievances including being prevented from going to the toilet, forced to miss two mid-year examinations and also made to spend three days in the school foyer as opposed to attending classes. The school, on the other hand, protests that she and her twin sister have a history of trouble-making that goes back to primary school and which is why the police were brought in (why on earth else would the school take the drastic step of bringing in the police?). This is an opportunity for all parties concerned as the school, the community, the educational department and the Human Rights Commission are all hopefully forced to find out the truth instead of obscuring the issues at hand: education, the future of our children and developing harmony among divergent communities that are now having to merge.

It is also bringing to attention the mixed message the headmaster of Roosevelt High appears to be sending in the newsletters on the school website, perhaps unwittingly.

His school has the common headache of collecting unpaid school fees, and his wording reminds us of the geographical dislocations that continue to be the heritage of apartheid, especially the problem of transport. I have made bold the words that seem to be a faux pas: “With respect to the school fees, I wish to reiterate, once again, the importance of meeting your obligation to keep paying … Surely payment towards a child’s education should take preference over, for example, cellphone contracts? (In most cases each family member has a cellphone.) These costs alone are often far more than the amount that is allocated for school fees on the family’s budget. Or, Roosevelt High is the choice of school because of the sound education received, but more money is spent on transport costs than on fees. In many cases, learners pass non fee paying schools on their way to Roosevelt High and then fees are not paid at our fee paying school. I cannot emphasise enough that the quality of education that is offered at fee paying schools is directly related to the school being able to balance its budget … ”

Is the exasperated headmaster hinting that the non-paying parents rather send their children to a non fee-paying school, which therefore (at least to his mind) has a lower educational standard? Well, it’s not a hint; it’s in your face. Should he be allowed to make this suggestion and the obvious extension: let the privileged get privileged education and the underprivileged get underprivileged “education”? My point is, I would never have looked at the school website had not the incident at Roosevelt High School been highlighted in the first place.