Limpopo Edu’s poor report card

Limpopo’s alarming public school system crisis, linked migration patterns stemming from a quest for access to city-based quality education and a great demand for infrastructure get impetus in a leaked document that brings together reports on the state of school readiness in districts of the province in mid-January 2018.
Lim faces disaster
Judging from information contained in the official document and from what was gained from follow-up expert interviews, the assertion that the province is seemingly not far from a disaster when considering that the growing challenges in education impact on the future of South Africa’s next generation cannot be ignored.
Threats against the public school system in Limpopo are manifold, with challenges seemingly presenting themselves in myriad forms.
A host of factors vary from learner migration patterns stemming from educators attached to rural-based schools themselves demanding quality education for their children when enrolling them with city institutions to an overcrowded facility in a far-flung location in the Vhembe district until this year reportedly dictating to Grade 1s to attend school on a rotation basis.
Inability of Department of Education
Referring to an intended R371 million spend to address a R4 billion infrastructure backlog in the next financial year, Democratic Alliance (DA) Provincial Leader Jacques Smalle who entrusted Polokwane Observer with the document remarked that those who needed access to proper education facilities the most might be going through an entire school career without being privy to a conducive learning environment due to the inability of the Department of Education to address issues at the current going rate.
The department was perceived as not to be handling the merger of schools and alternative arrangements in the light overcrowded facilities well, which contributed to over-crowding, he pointed out. To highlight the issue he claimed that 70 to 250 learners at a time were sharing classes at many schools across the province. In the Capricorn district the average occupancy rate at schools was estimated at 70 to 80 learners per class, he quoted. In such circumstances kids couldn’t even write in their books, he stressed.
67 learners in single class
The pressing issue of Grade 1 learners having to rotate where school attendance at Tshikhwani Primary School in the Sinthumule area in the Vhembe district was concerned, was one of the concerns raised. In terms of a new arrangement at the school, 67 Grade 1 learners were now being forced into a single class at a time, Smalle added.
Another concern he had was that nutrition programmes allegedly hadn’t been rolled out at schools in three circuits by Tuesday, due to service providers not having been appointed. According to him it affected 2 400 learners.
Population explosion in Mokopane
Information compacted between the pages of the confidential document directs attention to a population explosion in Mokopane and a permanent solution being needed to overcrowded facilities that could be solved through the recommended construction of new schools, additional facilities to replace outdated infrastructure or temporary mobile classrooms in the existing scenario.
Notes on the situation in the Waterberg district speak of waiting lists for secondary school starters and over-subscription of more than 1 000 learners at schools in the outlying locales in the Modimolle area where two new schools were planned for this year. The same counted for unplaced learners attempting to enrol with schools in the Lephalale and Bela-Bela areas. Mention is simultaneously made of a block of four classrooms at a school in Mookgophong area having been set on fire during protests in 2015 and the solution lying in the suggested provision of eight furbished mobile classrooms. By mid-January the number of required mobile classrooms for schools across the various circuits of the district totalled 37.
The issue of late applications for admission to schools in the same district in mid-January was further referred to, as was overcrowding of township schools attributed to migration from villages.
Seemingly six schools in the Sekhukhune district were experiencing admission pressures at the time, particularly with regards to the enrolment of Grades R, 1 and 8 learners. Five primary, secondary and comprehensive schools in the district were in dire need of mobile classrooms, according to the statistics revealed. At the same time the report on the situation in the district speaks of the alleviation of pressure on overcrowded facilities due to local farmers and a mining group donating blocks of classrooms at two institutions in Groblersdal and Steelpoort, while a new school in Burgersfort has relieved the impact on a local public primary school.
In the Mopani district the list of unplaced learners and demand for facilities at schools in the Giyani and Tzaneen areas bulges with up to 134 children on a waiting list as is the case at a primary school in Tzaneen, as stated in the document. In that district, too, the need for additional classrooms was underscored.
In the feedback on the situation in the Vhembe district the requirement for 45 schools needing 140 mobile classrooms due to dilapidated infrastructure, overcrowding and storm damage to facilities was most prominent. The information contained in the summary includes reference to 96 mobiles being available for relocation to 33 identified schools and an additional 44 still requiring for a remaining 12 schools. “Infrastructure has been favoured with our relocation plan.”
Complex situation depended on leadership from top
An expert in public administration and governance issues, who was interviewed on the basis of anonymity, sketched the details of what he referred to as a complex situation that largely depended on leadership from the top when assessing Limpopo’s public school system. He attributed the challenges in the provincial government education system to varying issues, including problems with the display of leadership throughout the entire structure as well as the migration from rural-based schools around Polokwane.
In this regard he used the example of principals and educators from outlying areas queueing with parents of learners at city schools in the dark of night when seeking alternative enrolment for their own children at institutions other than the ones where they themselves taught.
Creativity was what the Department of Education required to get out of the doldrums, he prescribed but concluded by expressing doubt whether they indeed had it.
No response to a request for comment from the spokesperson of the Department of Education has been received as yet upon a message having been left on his cell phone.

Story: YOLANDE NEL
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