BALDWIN NDABA
CHILDREN attending Joburg’s worst schools stand the greatest risk of being injured or killed getting there.
When they arrive, the computer equipment is most likely to have been stolen.
Many of their classmates will be using drugs and carrying lethal weapons – at school.
And, at one school – Senaoane Secondary in Soweto – teachers have actually been accused of drinking during school hours.
These are just some of the shock findings of the Gauteng legislature standing committee on education’s investigation into underperforming schools in three Joburg regions – despite the fact that the Gauteng Department of Education (GDE) has overspent its budget for the last two years.
The committee found continued poor performance in primary schools, poor performance of previously disadvantaged pupils in maths and science, a high repeat rate in Grades 10 and 11, and in all grades at primary schools.
The committee discovered a high dropout rate in secondary schools as well as a shortage of reading material in indigenous languages. The GDE had also failed to recruit appropriately qualified teachers for social sciences, a subject combining history and geography.
Committee chair Ammonite Chueu said these problems contined to beset public schools, even though the department overspent its budgets for public ordinary school education in both the 2008/9 and 2009/10 financial years.
Chueu’s team found underperforming schools in three regions – Joburg north, central and west, which includes Soweto.
Joburg north has 38 underperforming primary and 24 secondary schools, and Joburg west 38 primary and 15 secondary under-performing schools.
There were no numbers for Joburg central.
The committee raised its concern about pupils on the roads getting to and from school. About 4 400 pupils are being transported to school in Diepsloot and Cosmo City.
“The challenges faced are the latecoming of learners to the bus station and unroadworthy vehicles,” said Chueu.
Also, pupils were often embroiled in violent behaviour and schools were being burgled.
Now the GDE district office wants to hire security guards to protect schools from those “stealing taps, fence and water meters”.