Education in South Africa

[claidheamhmor]

Education is failing us here in South Africa.

The most recent stats for last year's matrics (grade 12 school leavers) have been published. 78% of the matrics passed the year. This sounds OK - after all, it's better than previous years - but then you dig a bit deeper.

For example:

• If you actually count all of the kids starting Grade 1 in 2002 who passed matric in 2013, then the pass rate is only 38%. In other words, on average, only 38% of our youth are successfully completing school.
• The Grade 9 average maths mark was 14%. Only 3% of Grade 9s got over 50% for maths.
• Only 3% of matrics got a distinction for maths. Only 40% of them scored over 40% for maths. Only 26% got over 50% (which is the minimum requirement for any science or commerce-based university course). Similar result for science.

In other words, while the overall pass rate sounds good, the vast majority of even those who passed are not actually educated enough for anything but unskilled jobs. Most of those getting into university can't get into the science and commerce courses, and as a result, SA is desperately short of graduates in the science and engineering fields.

Of course, because most matrics are not qualified enough to get decent jobs, unemployment goes up; the unemployment rate for people in the school-leaving age category is around 40%. Without jobs, poverty worsens, there's impact on the economy, and people aren't able to help their own children through school. It's a vicious cycle. :(

Comments

[acey.livejournal.com]

Wow - that seems pretty grim when you analyze it like that. :\

[claidheamhmor]

Yep. We have some major problems here; it's just going to widen the gap between the haves and the have-nots. :(

[cracked_belle]

"In other words, while the overall pass rate sounds good, the vast majority of even those who passed are not actually educated enough for anything but unskilled jobs."
the general consensus is that's what Bush's No Child Left Behind Act did in the US a few years back.

it sucks that, in general, people (both children and adults) are not being held as accountable for their schooling and their actions as they should be anymore. :/

[claidheamhmor]

I heard a bit about Bush's Act.

I agree on the accountability.

[filialucis]

Ouch, those figures don't look good at all.

Was it better in our day, do you have any idea? It would be interesting to know which way the long-term trend is going.

[claidheamhmor]

In our day, it sounded a lot better, but that's because the government masked the results for 80% of the population. I actually strongly suspect that the education results now, compared to the entire population in the 1980s and earlier, are better. However, it's not good enough; the new government has been in power for two decades, and not enough has been done to get school-leavers qualified at something that can serve them.

[filialucis]

"Strongly suspect" suggests that you don't have a breakdown of the stats by population groups? Now that would have been interesting.

Incidentally, I looked at my old school's website some time ago and gained the impression that there, at least, the quality of the education on offer has declined since my time. The subjects they're offering are fewer in number and on a narrower spectrum than they used to. Don't know what the academic standard is like (it was high in my day), but if I were an expat on a brief stint in ZA, I wouldn't want to send my kids there now.

[claidheamhmor]

Aha. Check out http://www.sairr.org.za/sairr-today-1/research-and-policy-brief-fifty-year-review-of-matric-results-10th-september-2010

Based on the very low numbers of black pupils writing matric (2 846 in 1970, up 29 973 in 1980, vs. half a million and more over the last few years), pass rates in our time would have essentially been the white pass rate. That link provides interesting reading though.

[filialucis]

Interesting indeed... and sobering. :S

I wonder whether the "lost generation" is a factor in this as well? There was an entire generation that pretty much missed out on a decent education at the end of the 1980s. If they make up a sizeable proportion of today's parents, how well-equipped are they to help their kids get through school, or even to teach them that education as such is important?

(Don't know what it's like in ZA, but around here, where in theory we have free access to all levels of education for everyone who wants it, children of parents with lower qualifications are much less likely to end up at university than children of graduates. There's a strong tendency to prefer leaving school at 15 and going into vocational training, since that way they "earn money immediately". That they're likely to always earn less than someone with better qualifications tends to get overlooked.)

[claidheamhmor]

Absolutely. Most of the parents of today's high-schoolers did not complete school themselves; as a result, they can't help their children with schoolwork, don't necessarily even understand what's involved, and by and large, are not in a financial position to be able to offer adequate living conditions for their children (most have no reliable electricity, for example). It's a vicious circle.