The DA in North West congratulates every matriculant who passed and excelled despite many obstacles and challenges.
However, Dr Tutu Faleni, DA NW Spokesperson on Education, said they are concerned about the steep decline in the matric pass rate in North West, declining nearly 6% since 2013.
He said learners have again been deprived of quality education and access to education due to poor ANC governance. Poor infrastructure, bad financial management, no proper planning and a lack of resources and teachers contribute to learners failing.
“By contrast, under DA governance the Western Cape has achieved excellent matric results with a pass rate of 85.9%, a bachelor pass rate of 40.9% of learners, the highest in the country and mathematics pass rate of 77.2 percent”, he said.
According to him in North West the story is sadly very different and the ANC has failed young people terribly. He said on paper a pass rate of 82.5% might sound promising – but in reality North West is the province with the highest unemployment rate. Passing matric is a stepping stone, but after school prospects for our youth are bleak.
“Poor planning and management of transport services for learners in the rural areas led to the loss of many valuable teaching hours. The prevalence of teen age pregnancies are alarming – causing thousands of female learners to drop out of school.
“We are also concerned that mathematics achievement has flat lined. The pass rate for Mathematics is only 51.1% (49.1% in 2015), and the rate for Maths Literacy has dropped for the fifth year in a row to 71.3%.
“It is still an open question whether the upward adjustments of the raw marks in mathematics, mathematical literacy and 26 other subjects led to an artificial inflation of the marks. We will be following up with the quality assurer, Umalusi, to make sure that the standardisation process was carried out correctly.
“The DA the North West is also concerned the Ministerial Task Team (MTT) appointed in 2016 by the National Minister of Education to investigate allegations of SADTU involved in the selling of promotional posts has revealed that schools and the Department of Education have been ‘captured ‘by SADTU. Such a situation will in the long term impact negatively in the delivery of the curriculum which will eventually affect the grade 12 results.
“The Democratic Alliance will raise the issues in the Ministerial Task Team report in the legislature and demand that the MEC for Education, Mr Sello Lehare, should immediately act on the recommendations made by the MTT in the North West Province.
“The MEC must account to the Legislature for these declining matric pass rate numbers, and I will ensure that proper explanations are provided to our learners,” he said.
By the time of publication The MEC for Education had not responded to the Herald’s request for comment.
