North Coast matrics celebrate iLembe’s top 5 pupils

After a 2 month delay, matric results announced this week show a 100% pass rate for the 4 local private schools, and a slight drop in passes for government schools in the iLembe region.

North Coast IEB schools were triumphant once again with Ashton International College Ballito, Crawford International College North Coast, Curro Mount Richmore and Destiny Life Academy all achieving a 100% pass rate.

Bachelor degree pass rates were also outstanding, with Ashton getting 98.6%, Crawford 97%, Curro 85% and Destiny Life 76%.

Despite a slight decline from last year’s pass rate countrywide, the Independent Examinations Board revealed last Friday that the class of 2020 achieved a pass rate of 98.07%, down from 2019’s 98.82%.

Just over 13 000 matriculants wrote the IEB examinations, of which locally some matriculants achieved results which fell into the top 1% of the country (See pages 9 – 14).

The Ilembe District matric pass rate dropped from 80.9% to 76.9% leaving the region ranked 6th among 12 districts in the province.

The provincial results were released on Tuesday morning and Stanger Manor Secondary pupil, Preshivan Govender was named the top student in the district with 7 distinctions and over 90% in all subjects.

Govender told the Courier that it all came through dedication and hard work.

“Working hard from day one helps a lot and even during the lockdown, I never stopped studying. We did not have online studying but I was able to get help from my teachers through WhatsApp.”

The 18-year-old said he would like to be a medical doctor and he has been provisionally accepted at several universities.

“If the University of KwaZulu-Natal do not respond, I will go to the University of Pretoria because they are also offering me a bursary. But my first choice is UKZN,” said Govender.

His mother, Salosshi Govender thanked his teachers and all who supported him.

“I was expecting him to do well because he is a very hard-working child and he was always disciplined. But I never imagined he would be number one in the district,” said Salosshi.

Stanger Manor Secondary delivered strong results with 3 of their pupils finishing in the district’s top 5.

The top 5 were: Ziphozonke Wiseman Gumede (Tugela Secondary School), Nevana Rampershadh (Stanger Manor Secondary School), Talia Shanice Augustine (Stanger Manor Secondary School), Mukeliwe Sthembile Mgobhozi (Hloniphani Secondary School) and Preshivan Govender (Stanger Manor Secondary).

144 307 students enrolled for matric across the province in 2020, with 135 276 writing the examinations between November 5 and December 15, 2020.

Of these, 104 985 achieved a passing grade. Countrywide, there was a 5.1% drop in pass rate from 81.3% in 2019, to 76.2% for 2020, while KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) dropped 3.7% from 81.3% to 77.6%.

This pass rate put KZN fourth in the country behind the Free State (85.1%), Gauteng (83.8%) and the Western Cape (79.9%).

KZN Premier Sihle Zikalala announced the results for the province at an event held at the new Anton Lembede Maths, Science and Technology Academy in La Mercy on Tuesday.

“The results this year nationally refl ects a qualitative dip compared to last year. 

“A similar trend is observed in KwaZulu-Natal, but we wish to state that these results are truly to be commended, given the strange and unusual circumstances we faced as a result of Covid-19,” said Zikalala.