Science degree 'too scary'

Pupils held back by lack of guidance

Dec 9, 2010 11:56 PM | By ANDILE NDLOVU

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As hundreds of thousands of matriculants await their exam results, many will already have made the wrong choice about what to study next year.

Economists and education experts have pointed to the failure of the career counselling system as one of the reasons many post-graduates are unemployed despite their academic achievements.

According to the Higher Education Management Information System database, 837779 students enrolled at public higher education institutions last year.

The biggest proportion, 43.5%, enrolled for humanities courses such as education and social services.

The science, engineering and technology courses, which have been pin-pointed as key sectors, received 28.3% of enrollments, and 28.2% of applications were for business courses.

David Gear, director of the StStithian's Foundation's Thandulwazi Maths and Science Academy Saturday School, said: "The economy lacks skills in almost every field. A better-educated - especially more literate and numerate - population would go a long way towards improving the situation.

"Our school population lags far behind First World norms of literacy and numeracy. A fully computer literate police force would be much more efficient and effective."

Andre Venter, divisional manager of the strategic development department of the United Association of SA union said: "There seems to be a [disparity] between what pupils are taught in school and the real world".

He said students should be prepared for when they leave school, either to study or to work.

University of the Free State rector Jonathan Jansen said the current curriculum lacked "depth, relevance and ambition".

Of the 263559 enrolments at Unisa, only 28536 were for science, engineering or technology-related degrees, whereas 83568 people enrolled for humanities and social sciences courses.

Education and business and management courses received 108288 enrolments.

Of the 13292 University of Zululand enrollments, only 1689 were for science courses.

Unisa's Doreen Gough said the university had received more than 90000 applications for 2011, most of them for economics, management and social sciences courses.

Ashley Stander, of Rhodes University, said that of 6207 applications most were for business-related courses.

The University of Limpopo received 8747 applications. The bachelor of medicine and bachelor of surgery courses had the biggest numbers of enrollments.

The University of Venda said humanities, education, health sciences, management sciences and environmental sciences ranked highest among the 6830 applicants.

The University of Cape Town's Mologadi Makwela said 22885 undergraduate applications had been received but gave no breakdown of the courses.

Western Cape features in world education study

McKinsey & Company, the international management consulting firm, has included the Western Cape in a study of improving education systems in 20 countries

“We are pleased to note that McKinsey & Company sees the Western Cape Education Department as an example of good practice,” said Donald Grant, Western Cape Education Minister.

“We have a long way to go, but the study suggests that we are on the right road. We’ll study the report carefully to see how we can fine-tune our strategy, so that we can move from good to excellent in the not-too-distant future.”

McKinsey released its findings today (Monday, 29 November 2010). The report is entitled “How the World’s Best Performing School Systems Keep Getting Better”.

The study sought to answer questions such as: “how does a school system with poor performance become good?”, and “how does one with good performance become excellent?”

McKinsey included the Western Cape in the latest study because of the improvement in the province’s literacy results in Grade 3 and 6 over the past eight years.

The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) is implementing a comprehensive strategy to improve literacy and numeracy performance, which includes annual diagnostic testing of learners in Grades 3, 6 and 9.

McKinsey organised an international, online “webinar” today (29 November 2010) to discuss the results. Participants included education specialists in Canada, Hong Kong and the Western Cape, moderated by McKinsey partners.

Brian Schreuder, Deputy Director-General, Curriculum Management at the WCED, represented the Western Cape.

McKinsey researchers interviewed 200 system stakeholders and analysed 600 interventions in 20 countries.

McKinsey says that the report identifies reform elements that are replicable for school systems elsewhere as they move from poor to fair, good to great and to excellent performance.

The report identified eight key findings, namely:

1.

A system can make significant gains from wherever it starts. The report notes that “even systems starting from low levels of performance, such as Madhya Pradesh in India, Minas Gerais in Brazil, and the Western Cape in South Africa, have significantly improved their literacy and numeracy levels within just two or four years, while making strides in narrowing the achievement gap between students from different socio-economic backgrounds”.

2.	There is too little focus on “process” in the debate today. The report identified three important intervention types, namely, education structures, resources and process. Most successful interventions highlight “process”, or how instruction is delivered, rather than content.

3.

Each particular stage of the school system improvement journey is associated with a unique set of interventions. The report found a striking similarity between interventions in different countries that managed to achieve improvement, for example, from poor to fair and upwards, irrespective of culture, geography, politics or history.

4.	A systems context might not determine what needs to be done, but it does determine how it is done. While interventions were similar, the report found considerable variation in how interventions were implemented.

5.

Six interventions occur frequently at every performance stage for all systems. Common interventions included: teacher and principal training; student assessment; improving data systems; policy and legislative improvement; revising standards and curriculum; and ensuring appropriate rewards and remuneration.

6.	Systems further along the journey sustain improvement by balancing school autonomy with consistent teaching practice.

7.	Leaders take advantage of changed circumstances to ignite reforms. Three circumstances typically triggered reform. These included a socio-economic crisis; a high-profile, a critical report; and notably, a change of leadership.

8.	Leadership continuity is essential. The study found that leadership is essential for both sparking and sustaining reform. Some regions had managed to maintain continuity despite changes in political leadership. These included Armenia, the Western Cape and Lithuania.

Key elements of the WCED’s literacy and numeracy strategy include diagnostic testing and analysis, target setting, teacher training and support, coordination, critical engagement and ensuring sustainability.

The full report is available here (pdf size: 3 891 KB)
The executive summary is available here (pdf size: 219 KB).
To view the video presentation, click here

For comment by McKinsey & Company, contact
Marlynie Moodley at 011-506-8186

For comment from the Western Cape Education Department, contact
Brian Schreuder at 082 373 5989

WCED prepared and ready for 2011

Statement by Donald Grant, Western Cape Education Minister

Tomorrow marks the end of the 2010 academic school year.

It has been a challenging year for education. An enormous amount of effort has been put into ensuring that our learners receive a quality education in the midst of various disruptions this year.

The extended June/July holiday and the public servants strike are two such examples.

However, I am proud of how our Department, districts and schools have rallied together to offset the effects of these disruptions. I am also pleased with the significant progress we have made this year in reaching our overarching objective of improving education in this province.

Examples include the passing of the Western Cape Provincial School Education Amendment Bill, the expansion of literacy and numeracy testing, the rollout of extra textbooks, targeted interventions in underperforming schools and the successful implementation of our infrastructure programme.

We do realize though, that we still have some way to go in ensuring that every child receives a quality education.

In 2011, we will continue to build on the foundations we have laid this year, specifically targeting the early phases of learning and the literacy and numeracy skills of our learners

Some of our plans include increasing textbook provision in grades 2 and 3, the provision of maths textbooks for every child in Grades 2 to 7, and the distribution of reading schemes for home languages and first additional languages for primary schools.

In September, we issued a School Planning Calendar for the 2011 school year in order to prepare teachers, principals and parents well in advance about education activities planned for 2011.

The calendar included a schedule of dates for training programmes, meetings, tests and examinations, as well as, other important administrative deadlines.

This has allowed schools enough time to pro-actively plan ahead and prepare for the upcoming year.

Another major focus for 2011 is the protection of instruction time.

Therefore, officials have been working around the clock to ensure that teaching and learning will start on the first day of new school year, helping schools to finalise timetables and to resolve staffing, administrative and security issues, where necessary.

The Department does expect some late enrolments by learners, especially those that have migrated from other provinces, and have therefore identified areas where there might be high levels of demand. These include, Kuilsrivier, Mfuleni, Hout Bay, Delft, Du Noon, Wallacedene, Plettenberg Bay, Mosselbay and George.

We are expecting 83 000 learners to qualify for enrolment in Grade 1 next year.

In terms of the holiday period, the Western Cape Education Department's Safe Schools Division has arranged a number of holiday programmes at specific schools.

Most of these programmes will run in the week of 13-17 December and will occupy learners with sport activities, arts and crafts and discussions about drug awareness and safety.

In terms of school safety, Safe Schools will put in place 24 hour security patrols at 130 identified schools and 240 schools will receive cluster patrols during the holiday period.

I am also calling on the community to be vigilant and to report any suspicious behavior at our schools during this period.

Finally, I would like to wish all our educators, learners and staff a happy and safe holiday. Thank you for your support and dedication.

We can all be proud of our efforts this year and look forward to what we can achieve in 2011.

The 2010 literacy and numeracy results will allow us to determine new targets for primary schools, as well as, where to focus our strategies, and it is with great anticipation that we will wait for the release of the 2010 NSC results. These results will determine whether the strategies we have put in place this year have been successful and will provide us with new targets for 2011.

Teachers hard at work marking matric papers

About 3700 markers are hard at work marking about 800 000 scripts submitted by Western Cape candidates for the 2010 National Senior Certificate examinations.

Brian Schreuder, Deputy Director-General: Curriculum Management at the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) said that marking began yesterday (Wednesday, 8 December 2010) and would end on Wednesday, 15 December 2010.

The markers are marking papers for a total of 64 papers under strict security. The WCED has employed 450 students to check the marks before they are captured. The department has deployed 71 officials to administer the marking process.

Here's to a great Festive Season and a Prosperous New Year!

Hot off the press - Chalkline's November Issue

The November Issue of Chalkline is now available and will be arriving at your school shortly.

Featured articles include; "School Violence, Alcohol Abuse Has ANCYL Worried" and "Permaculture Education - Gearing Our Children For The Future" which looks at the SEED programme.

We also have an inspiring story about an Eerste River father, who has gone the extra mile to assist educators by offering extra mathematics classes, in a brand new section called Community & The School. If you know of or have an inspiring story related to teaching, send it through to us: admin@peachcom.co.za.

Many thanks to our readers who responded so wonderfully to our Recipes section. This month we feature Honey Baked Chicken Drumsticks, which was sent in by Maajida Kasu.
We also look closely at The Robben Island Museum in our What Is It? section.
In our Health section, we look at what Dr. Margaret Chan from the World Health Organisation has to say about the close relationship between health provision and the fight against poverty.

Along with our regular features, Healthy Living, Education in the Media, Environment and the Classroom and My Favourite Teacher, this issue is packed with issues that relate to you, the teacher.

We want to wish all our readers and advertisers a wonderful holiday and festive season.

Happy teaching,
The Chalkline Team

Learner Discipline & School Management

Available for download from WCED Online, a comprehensive outline of learner discipline and related school management processes and issues.

Thousands of Grade 12 learners receive tuition via an interactive satellite broadcast

In January, the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) made a commitment to improve Grade 12 learner outcomes in the Western Cape and initiated the campaign “Own YOUR future. Own YOUR success. Study hard to pass YOUR matric” which both encourages and supports learners to put maximum effort into their studies in the remaining months of their school career up to their final National Senior Certificate Examinations.

One of the interventions introduced to schools is the Interactive Telematics Programme which is a collaborative project between the WCED and the Division of Telematic Services at Stellenbosch University.

Read More...

Celebrating school library month

Speech by Minister Donald Grant

I am delighted to be here today in celebration of International School Library Month.

The number one priority of Western Cape Education Department (WCED) is to improve the literacy and numeracy skills of all our learners. Literacy performance in the Western Cape has improved steadily over the years, thanks to special interventions, but the results are still not good enough.

Read more....

The Media Development and Diversity Agency

Chalkline is proudly supported by the Media Development and Diversity Agency.

Please visit their website for further details.

www.mdda.org.za/

Chalkline Re-launch

Chalkline had it's official re-launch at the end of September at Cafe' St. Georges in The Crypt at St. Georges Cathedral in Cape Town.

Follow the link to view photos from the event.

Bursaries Galore

Chalkline has sourced an extensive list of bursaries that is available for free to all schools. We cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information and suggest you follow up to ascertain details and other pertinent information yourself.

If you would like a copy of the list, please contact us on admin@peachcom.co.za.

The Editor

Grade 3 and 4 Pregnancies Probed

The national Department of Basic Education is investigating how the Western Cape could have had more pregnant schoolgirls in grades 3 and 4 than in grades 11 and 12 during the 2006 and 2007 school years, says Independent Online.

A new report compiled by he department shows that in 2006, 10 Grade 3 pupils and 26 Grade 4 pupils fell pregnant in the Western Cape, compared to one Grade 11 and three matriculants.

Teachers To Strike Over Pay?

Bloomberg News is reporting that South African Government workers, including teachers, may strike over a pay dispute. Unions are demanding an 8.6% pay rise and the government is offering 6.5%. All told, almost 1.3 million workers could go on strike.

Outcomes-Based Education To Be Scrapped

According to TIMES LIVE, the much maligned outcomes based education system introduced by Professor Kader Asmal in 1996 is about to be scrapped in favour of a new schooling system called Schooling 2025. An announcement is expected on 13 July 2010.

SA Urged To Build On WC Success

Archbishop Desomond Tutu has urged the country to "build classrooms" and other amenties that benefit the poor saying, "we have proved to ourselves we can do anything we set our minds to."

Separately, President Zuma said the event was the "beginning of a better future for South Africa and all Africans."

A more sobering note was struck in Zimbabwe however, at a workshop that discussed how the benefits of the World Cup can be used to benefit the Continenet with speakers suggesting that Africa needs $11 billion to educate children.