Rirhandzu Ngwenya – passionate about building moral values

Editorial

Rirhandzu Ngwenya (57) takes great pride in her position as Northern Academy Primary School Executive Head yet she is at the same time humbly honoured that her day task entails running the biggest primary school in the country with 1 388 learners.
Asked about her mission she said: “I want to build and quality academic school with high moral values. A school of independent thinkers which enables all learners to realise their potential in terms of academics, sport and culture within a Christian environment.”
But achieving this comes with ample challenges considering the high enrolment and other elements. According to her one of the big challenges is the transition from one phase to another. She explained that some learners, especially in the Foundation Phase, are overwhelmed when moving onto the next phase with many more subjects and educators. Her dream would be to see a system where subjects are gradually added to learner’s curriculum.
She also remarked that all learners are thrown into one basket while there are still learners who need special attention. “Some parents also struggle to identify their children’s needs and the expect miracles from teachers. This issue has already been addressed with a programme in which we collaborate with parents and experts to address needs of learners in order to have them obtaining good marks,” Ngwenya said.
Regarding a punishing system Ngwenya does not believe in corporal punishment. “The challenge is to find a balance between punishment in school and punishment at home. Some children still get a hiding at home whereas we are not allowed to do that in school. This means that some learners will only respond to corporal punishment because they are used to it at home, creating the challenge in school to discipline a child with a merit system,” she said.
Ngwenya matriculated in Limpopo after which she joined Hoxane College of Education in Mpumalanga followed by completing her Bachelor’s degree in Education at the then University of the North as well as an advanced certificate in management at the University of Venda.
Her career as teacher started in 1985 at various schools in Mpumalanga and Gauteng until she relocated to Limpopo where she spent most of her career as Head of Department at Ngiko Primary School in Mopani district. She also held positions as deputy principal and principal at schools in the same district until she accepted to position as Executive Head at Northern academy in January 2018.

Story and photo: RC Myburgh
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