Education Minister announces the 2015 NSC results
Education Minister Angie Motshekga announced a shocking 5% decrease in NSC performance since 2014.
Gopolang Chawane
Almost 30% of pupils who sat for the national senior certificate exam last year failed. This is a 5% increase from 2014.
This according to results announced by Basic Education Angie Motshekga at Vodacom World in Midrand today.
In 2014, 75.8% of the pupils who sat for the exams compared 70.7% last year which means 455 825 candidates passed last year.
The top performing province, Western Cape, achieved 84.7%, up from 82.2% in 2014 while close second, Gauteng recorded a 84.2% pass.
The Tshwane South district was one of the top ten districts with the highest pass rate overall. It scored an 86.8% pass rate placing it tied for seventh place with Ekhurhuleni North.
Minister Motshekga said the class of 2015 had recorded the highest enrolment of Grade 12 pupils in the history of the basic education system in South Africa.
“A total of 110 000 more candidates enrolled for the 2015 NSC exam than those who wrote in 2014.”
She said the total number of candidates who registered for the November 2015 NSC exam was 799 306.
“We need to congratulate Gauteng for producing the largest number of Bachelor passes at 38 760. Gauteng had 108 442 candidates in total”. Motshekga said
“Well done to the Gauteng Education MEC Panyaza Lesufi and his team, she added.
The increase in the number of Bachelor passes, was from 150 737 in 2014 to 166 263 last year.
The performances in mathematics and physical science, which are gateway subjects, improved by number of passes though this was a decrease by percentage. This probably means overall, more pupils wrote the subjects.
Last week Umalusi, the monitoring body, announced that the 2015 class of matriculants who sat for national senior certificate performed worse than last year’s group.
The poor performance could be due to the high standards of this year’s question papers, Umalusi council chairperson Professor John Volmink announced at a media briefing in Pretoria.
President Jacob Zuma urged families, neighbours, the government and communities to support those who have failed.
Basic education director-general Mathanzima Hubert Mweli,who gave an in-depth technical analysis of the results said it was important for the pupils to understand that this was a “mirror” displaying the health of the educational system.
The department will also launch a second chance matric programme to provide support to pupils who did not pass.
The Department of Social Development has also made available counseling to the matric class of 2015 via a 24-hour call centre at 0800-428-428. Pupils can use the callback service by dialling *120*7867# (free) from any cellphone.
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