By Lehlohonolo Mofokeng Although our township schools prove year in year out that they are capable of producing world movers and sharers, much of their potential is untapped because of factors that only JK Rowling could describe in depth. But what do privileged schools do to level the educational playing field that is often characterised […]
education crisis
Posted inEquality, General
Education: What’s the point of it all?
A few weeks ago, I read an article to my grade 11 students with the headline “Youth unemployment in South Africa – apartheid is alive and well”. My students are usually opinionated when it comes to certain issues, but not this time. They walked out of the classroom in silence. I noticed their quizzical looks […]
Posted inEquality, News/Politics
Distinctions and defeat: The scramble for universities
The dust has finally settled. Most schools (at least those which have textbooks and teachers present) are back into the routine. The matric results frenzy has ebbed. I’ve always been disturbed by the country’s obsession with matric results every year as though we will discover something different. Every time I think about the frenzy I […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Madiba and education
I found out about uTat’Madiba’s passing on the last day of the school term. I wasn’t surprised. We saw this coming. The main theme that seems to reverberate throughout all the tributes to Tata is that we are at the end of an era and how we are going to move forward in this era […]
Posted inBusiness, Tech
Academia is Africa’s last hope
“I am studying mathematics because I wanted to study something as difficult as it is useless.” I follow this statement with a polite laugh and wink. This is how I answer a person asking me why I’m studying a subject that most people regard with a terrified shudder (no doubt linked to their bad memories […]
Posted inGeneral
Where the textbook teachers?
By Athambile Masola I’ve been following the Limpopo textbook saga with half an ear. The furore unfolded while my learners and I were undergoing the arduous and exhausting process of mid-year exams. The debacle has been yet another crude reminder of the compromise of a constitutional right as well as the incompetence of the department […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Grading the ANC policy document on education
By Robyn Clark In March 2012, the ANC released a series of documents intended to stimulate discussion around what the ANC has achieved over the last 18 years in South Africa, and what it should further achieve in the future. The aim of the documents is to encourage discussions around the policy process, which will […]