The 2024 online admissions application period for Grade 1 and 8 learners officially went live on Thursday morning, receiving about 60 000 applicants in the first hour.
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Gauteng Education MEC, Matome Chiloane kicked off the morning at the Winterveldt Multipurpose Hall, Pretoria, marking the opening of the application period for this year.
MEC Chiloane assured parents that the system was efficient and had been improved to iron out glitches and system crashes and ensure that parents are able to navigate the website without challenges.
He said a major improvement to the system was its enabled capacity to now manage the high number of applications a minute.
“The first thing we improved was its broad width, the ability to manage the applications per minute. we have improved it to about 50 000 applications per minute so as you can see we have not gone close to that capacity as we have gone to 60 000 in an hour so that shows that aspect has been efficient. The system is user-friendly. Anyone can do it,” said Chiloane, addressing the media.
According to the MEC, his department is all hands on deck to ensure everything is smooth and had set up 80 walk-in centers to offer support and access for parents to complete applications at various sites across the province.
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“We have walk-in centers in different community halls, in particular in our township areas. All our schools are walk-in centers, parents can go to the school. We have municipal libraries, and provincial government libraries have also been opened for parents to do that. We also have a hotline, toll-free number parents can call if they experience any problems.”
He further urged parents to apply during the open period in order to get their children placed at their desired schools, emphasizing that parents should not wait for late applications.
He added that the department intended to ensure that all learners that are going to be registered in the current period have been placed on the first day of the 2024 academic year.
“We do have contingency plans in place for late applications, but I urge parents to register now and not wait until applications are closed.
Applying on time allows us to plan accordingly so when they come late, they make it difficult because by that time, the spaces are full so we are forced to come up with alternative ways so that we get learners placed,” he said.
The application period will close on July 14.
