Basic education portfolio committee visits Mpumalanga schools

The portfolio committee of basic education conducted an oversight and monitoring visit at Mpumalanga schools from Monday 22 to Thursday August 25.

On Tuesday, the committee, comprised of MPs from the National Assembly as well as MPLs from the Provincial Legislature, met at DD Mabuza Secondary School for an interaction with the MEC for education, Bonakele Majuba, the HOD, Lucy Moyane, and members of senior management, on the state of schooling in the province.

During the gathering, Majuba said, “We are making all endeavours to improve the delivery of education and to ensure that our learners are able to compete with their counterparts in other parts of the world. Our desire, like all responsible parents, is that the Class of 2022 may attain a 100% pass rate, however, if that does not happen we may be comforted to obtain 83% pass rate.”

In his address, Majuba shared plans and gave updates on the provincial schools. The department has launched the UbuhleBuzile e-Learning Programme, which is currently being implemented for Grade 12 learners in quintiles 1 to 3 schools.

“Learners and teachers from these schools were provided with tablets and laptops with the requisite education supplementary resources, textbooks, study guides and previous question papers. Like any initiative at a commencement stage, it is bound to have teething challenges, however, the department will do everything possible in its power to ensure that the programme succeeds in the best interest of our learners.”
Majuba said they are encouraged by the participation of learners in the technical streams following the transformation of some secondary schools into technical high schools.

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“The department is working towards ensuring that there is at least one technical high school in each of the 71 circuits in Mpumalanga. There are 42 technical high schools within the province. Next year, we plan to increase them to 52. We are working with the private sector companies to achieve this.”

He said the safety of schools, teachers and learners is something that concerns them.

“It is intensified by incidents that occur in our communities, but find their ugly ways into schools. These bad things include gangsterism, trafficking and abuse of illicit substances, the carrying of dangerous weapons and so on. Vandalism of school property, break-ins and other forms of crimes are a serious challenge and seem to be on the rise. We launched a programme to mobilise all stakeholders and communities to protect schools. It is called the the Rhandza Xikolo Xa Wena Campaign. Loosely translated, it means ‘Love your school’.”

The department’s integration of early childhood development (ECD) took place.

“Notwithstanding some challenges, overall the process went on very well and we continue to thank our sister department, social development, for its co-operation and guidance in this regard. Some of these challenges relate to issues of registration, compliance by ECD centres, inadequate capacity, lack of support and shortage of human resources to support the centres.

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“This led to delays in effecting due payments to the centres, however, I am encouraged by the progress made in that aspect to date.

“The backlog of school infrastructure remains huge, which delays the department from meeting its school infrastructure targets.
“This was worsened by unforeseen circumstances and unplanned disasters like storm damages. Other competing priorities such as unsafe structures, overcrowding and demand for new schools remain our preoccupation.”