Take a bow matric class of 2022, you earned it

Far from being the cursed matric children of 2022, this crop of Grade 12’s is arguably the toughest, most innovative bunch of kids produced in this country’s school crumbling system since 1994.

They began Grade 10, aka the foundation for matric, in 2020 when the world went into an unprecedented lockdown during the never-seen-before Covid-19 pandemic.

They built the foundation for these exams in isolation, or via e-learning for rich kids.

But for public school children and in most cases in rural South Africa, they were confined to small, minimally resourced homes with no access to the internet.

Then in Grade 11, amid varying levels of lockdown, playing catch-up, learning to adapt to the part time-in person teaching and resocialising, they were also absorbing new academic information that they are going to be tested on in the next few days.

If that wasn’t enough, these pupils were exposed to frightening political instability when the July riots hit KwaZulu-Natal, throwing fuel on a then-growing, cost of living crisis.

Thereafter, in 2022 just as normalcy began to resume, the world was plunged into war when Russia invaded Ukraine which brought about a global energy supply crisis.

But contrary to what the politicians would have you believe, South Africa’s worsening electricity crisis was more than a decade in the making.

The class of 2022 will now sit for their final exams during the country’s worst service delivery crisis in history, with power, water, and possible fuel shedding.

Lower matric result anticipated

Nonprofit educational organisation, Foundation for Education and Social Justice Deputy Chairperson Hendrick Makaneta, said parents should prepare themselves for a matric lower result than in previous years.

“With regards to the challenges faced by Eskom, it is clear that the schools that will be hardest hit are public schools, particularly those in townships and rural areas,” said Makeneta.

“The constant load shedding in these communities will definitely have a negative impact on the examinations as it’s becoming obvious that the majority of pupils are based in poor rural communities and lack of electricity makes it entirely difficult to prepare for exams.”

His sentiments were echoed by the youth mentoring programme, Tomorrow Leaders in Training managing director, Burt Ronald.

“Under-resourced communities pupils are at a greater disadvantage and will increase mental health pressure. Greater-resourced schools can continue in the crisis.

“Service delivery woes have lowered the morale of students, there’s a varying degree of hopelessness in terms of the future,” said Ronald.

Matrics of 2022: A master class in flipping a bad situation

But both men were at pains to point out, that despite the overwhelmingly strained circumstances, this matric class of 2022 has already shown signs of being able to flip a bad situation.

“Even if there is lower academic performance, there is a resilience being built into this crop of matrics, that we’ve never seen in other classes.

“What has been planted in them in the long term could see us having a lot more entrepreneurs and innovation in the future, ” said Ronald.

“The class of 2022 is the most resilient class in the history of our education system post-1994. If they survived the difficult period of Covid-19, they surely ought to survive the next few weeks of exams,” added Makaneta.

Public school teachers have also risen to the challenge, sacrificing personal time to provide extra classes.

The Department of Basic Education Department said Eskom was unable to exempt the country’s 6 912 examination centers from power cuts. It’s since passed the burden of proving power to schools during exams to provincial departments.

The Gauteng education department has contingency plans in place. It has provided and rented generators for the province’s public schools as matriculants sitting for the final exam of their school life.

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