Primary school stats delivered at summit

MEC for the Gauteng Department of Education and Youth Development, Panyaza Lesufi, announced the performance of all primary schools in Gauteng at a summit at the Rhema Bible Church on 7 March.

Lesufi said, “Grade 12 results start here. This is a new chapter in shaping critical skills. We need to show that children are at the centre of our nation’s development. Primary school education has never been more important than now.

“This inaugural primary school summit is groundbreaking. We need to fix the foundation phases of education. It will set a strong foundation. Every country’s most important resource is people. Investment in people is the most important thing when they have skills, they will make a plan and they will survive.”

Gauteng HOD of Education Edward Mosuwe read out the statistics for the hundreds of representatives from primary schools across the province.

He stressed that mathematics education was of utmost importance and over four years, mathematics performance in the province has declined.

“Literacy and numeracy skills are going to be our focus on driving success in primary schools. We will be providing resources to schools and we will make sure they are used. We encourage schools to come to us to tell us what they need.”

The MEC stressed that primary school learners need to learn coding, sign language, entrepreneurship and many other skills.

Mosuwe also stressed that nurturing home languages at a primary school level is imperative to fixing problems in our education system.

“From 2003 we had 147 000 students starting Grade 1, by Grade 12, that number reached 91 000, which is 62 per cent throughput.”

Gauteng Premier David Makhura, who initiated the drive for primary school statistics, was also in attendance.

He said, “I directed MEC Lesufi to conduct an audit of all of our primary schools and make the results known so that we can formulate a plan to drive primary school education. The best performing department in Gauteng is the department of education. Our 2030 vision is to achieve a 95 per cent pass rate in our schools.”

ALSO READ: WATCH: Gauteng Premier David Makhura and MEC for Education Panyaza Lesufi handover bursaries

Makhura also stressed the importance of gathering primary school statistics. “More attention needs to be placed on gathering statistics from primary schools. We focus too much on Grade 12. The foundation is shaking and it needs to be strengthened. We want to direct more resources to primary schools to cultivate success in the early years.”

Lesufi added, “With the release of these results, we need to embrace new changes, and our children need critical skills. We have been given a large budget to drive this. We need the help of the department of health to screen learners for any physical or mental deficiency they may have when entering school that may hinder their success. We also need a multi-certificate solution when children are finished school, not just a matric.

“We have also partnered with various universities to help us with a Grade R education plan, and we thank them for their support.”

Related Article: 

https://northeasterntribune.co.za/249428/gauteng-matrics-achieve-80-per-cent-plus-pass-rate-2019-matricresults19/