Bring back glory days of teaching – Motshekga

Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga has called on the sector to initiate quality teaching at lower grades in a bid to produce better high school results.

Addressing the basic education sector lekgotla in Pretoria yesterday, Motshekga also said teachers with fake qualifications deserved no mercy.

“These fake teachers go against everything this country stands for, as a sanctuary of hope and progress,” Motshekga said. “All provinces must have appropriately qualified teachers for the subjects they teach.”

The minister called for “decisive” action against teachers who abused pupils – either sexually, verbally or physically.

“We must free the basic education system of corrupt and fraudulent practices like the selling of posts, leaking of exam papers, and the like,” she said.

“A basic education system, free of all these ills, must be what all aspire to.”

Motshekga said an improvement in the fundamental quality of learning and teaching was her department’s goal.

“Research shows the root causes of pupils dropping out from school toward the end of their secondary school year are weak learning foundations during the earlier grades.”

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She said her department’s priority would be to equip pupils – from early on in the system – with skills to cope with the curricula of the higher grades.

To achieve this, the basic education department would prioritise interventions and policies in a bid to implement accountability systems to ensure the desired outcomes were achieved.

“Another specific way to prioritise an improving quality of basic education is to foreground pupils’ outcomes in the activities throughout the sector, especially in literacy and numeracy outcomes at the primary school level,” Motshekga said.

The minister congratulated officials, principals and provinces for a job well done for the 2016 matric pass rate. But she had strong words for underperforming provinces that continued to fall below the 60% pass rate.

“As political principals, we must refuse to be like mushrooms – kept in the dark and fed on manure,” she said.

“It’s our duty – and the right of the public – to demand accountability at all levels of the basic education system. We must restore the classroom to its heyday as the Holy Grail of teaching and learning.”

– ericn@citizen.co.za