Eastern Cape school infrastructure to improve (23 November 2011); Eastern Cape Department of Education

Eastern Cape school infrastructure to improve

Posted on Wednesday, 23 November 2011
Article by Francis Hweshe

Cape Town - The Department of Basic Education has announced plans to eradicate 50 mud schools in the Eastern Cape by March next year.

Over R400 million has been earmarked for this purpose and contractors are expected to be working throughout the upcoming holidays in order to meet the deadline.

The department has also identified 300 schools across the country which should be electrified by the same deadline.

A total of R8.4 billion has been set aside for school infrastructure development and R700 million specifically to deal with doing away with mud schools in the country.

A delegation from the department revealed this to Parliament's Portfolio Committee on Basic Education on Tuesday. The delegation had come to present their second quarterly reports on the Quality Learning and Teaching Campaign and the Technical Secondary Schools Recapitalisation Programme.

While the reports were welcomed, of concern to some of the committee members, was the issue of overcrowding in schools as well as shortages of teachers, which they said negatively affected learning.

ANC member James Skosana said dealing with classroom overcrowding was long overdue, despite having discussed the issue for many years, and asked the department what their plans were in this regard.

His colleague Florence Mushwana concurred, saying: "We can't continue mass teaching. If we want better results, let's reduce classes."

The delegation responded by saying they wanted to have 140 000 teachers participating in targeted priority teacher development activities this year.

In the first quarter, their report said that a target of 35 000 teachers had been met and in the second quarter, a target of 31 710 had been achieved.

It said that the number of teachers aged below 30 entering the public service was targeted at 6 200 and nearly 3 000 had entered in the first quarter and 2 000 in the second quarter.

The delegates also said that 5 000 and 1 326 bursaries were awarded respectively in the first and second quarter for students to enroll in teacher training. Their overall target had been an enrollment of 8 517 students.

ANC Committee Member Gina Nomalungelo asked why they kept getting several reports on the shortage of teachers in schools, despite the information in the reports.

Highlighting some of their successes, the delegation said that 24 million Grade 1 to 6 language and mathematics workbooks were printed and delivered to almost 19 000 public schools in nine provinces for the 2011 school year.

A total of 12 million volume 2 workbooks were also delivered to all schools by 29 July for work to be covered from August to December. - BuaNews

Article Tags: mud schools, infrastructure

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Posted by Bongs - 18:45 on 16 December 2011

As an educator myself, I'm wondering why do we as education loving South Africans have to resort to using the media so that we can be heard. The ECDoE is badly publicised as thee most underperforming department, both in schools (curriculumwise) and at the Provincial Office(administratively). We have the Mandela Day being observed Nationally to assist needy communities, with activities done left, right and centre, and on top of that, some of our national leaders feel that we should make everyday a Mandela Day. I also feel the same way, we should do everything in our powerboth as professionals and development-loving South Africans to assist our communities. I tried to live up to my belief, by trying to assist a certain community just outside Mdantsane. They have no public facilities like schools and clinics, to mention but a few. I've been running around like a headless chicken since 2008 trying to convince the East London district office manager to respond to that, but all in vain. I have already acquired 2 temporary structures from CFG (formerly known as Px) and I managed to get a sponsor to transport these to the site. Together with these structures, is a dellapidated building that needs to be renovated, and I'm also awaiting a sponsorship of three 6m containers by the Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality. These structures are more than enough to start a school,aren't they? How much does it cost to register a public school?. The ECDoE has a redeployment policy on the table as I write, but when one puts on the table something that could assist the same department, to at least solve a certain percentage of its problems, they are being undermined. One family in that community lost their child due to a car accident on the way from school and another one is using crushes as I write, all because they had to walk to school in the absence of the scholar transport. How many children must die for the community to be heard? Must I use other ways and means to be taken serious? Must I know someone somewhere to get help? Is it a crime to help the helpless? Need I be a celebrity for doors to open-up for me? I will take this up with the national office, that is a promise not a threat.

Thanks
Mr B Ndawo
0732408765

Posted by Proudly EC - 08:55 on 08 December 2011

I need more info on this, who to talk to with regards to the tendering system. I am interested more on the electrification side of schools.