It is all systems go for online admission

THOUGH there were challenges with the online learner application system, it is now up and running. The website, www.gdeadmissions.gov.za, started working on Wednesday, April 19, at 14:30.

Gauteng Education MEC Panyaza Lesufi and his department humbled themselves and apologised to the people of Gauteng and South Africa at large for the eight-day delay as the website was supposed to be up by April 11.

The delay was caused by technical difficulties with GPS coordinates that were generating wrong school data.

“The system will handle a large quantity of traffic as capacity has been increased to 20 000 logins per second. I am confident that this will work. During the first second of going live, the system experienced over 18 000 logins and within the first 10 minutes, the system had successfully processed 5 035 applicants,” explained MEC Lesufi.

After 18 hours since the system went live, 188 000 parents had successfully processed their applications. They have also received feedback from the system which provided them with a reference number indicating whether they are on Waiting list A or B.

Again on Tuesday, April 19, at 15:17, the system experienced high demand and 37 800 logins per second were recorded.

With that success, the department received disturbing news on April 20, that there were 13 unsuccessful attempts to hack the system.

Acting head of communication, Oupa Bodibe said the objectives of those behind these attempts remain a mystery to them, but they have been assured by their technicians that the system is well secured to prevent attempts of this nature.

“We acknowledge that there might be few glitches in the system. Some parents who tried applying online have received some error messages and as a result they could not proceed with their applications,” Bodibe said.