The forum said on Thursday it urged “coloured communities” to not view the signing of the “draconian” Bill as something that would only affect “traditionally white schools”.  

“This is a fight for every school and every household in South Africa and specifically the Afrikaans-speaking communities,” said the forum. 

“Our experience so far is that many communities may take a never-mind attitude towards Bela because the ANC created the impression that it is only former Model C schools — in other words, traditionally white schools — that oppose it,” said Heindrich Wyngaard, the executive chairperson of the forum.

“However, we know that this is not the case, as traditionally coloured schools can also be forced by the legislation to adjust their Afrikaans language policy to accommodate small numbers of non-Afrikaans-speaking learners.”

Critics of the Bill unanimously view it as political interference in schools, saying that school governing bodies, and therefore parents, should not be undermined. 

Lobby group AfriForum and trade union Solidarity have said they will approach the courts when the Bill is signed. ActionSA said on Wednesday night that it would also consider legal action if the Bill was signed into law. ActionSA has called the Bill “a power grab by the basic education minister”. 

When it comes to language policy, the school governing body is in charge of setting that policy, but the Bill emphasises that this is not unequivocal, and the provincial head of the education department may “intervene” when there is what is deemed discriminatory language or admission policy.  

The Bill was tabled by former education minister Angie Motshekga and seeks to amend the South African Schools Act of 1996 and the Employment of Educators Act of 1998.

Once signed it will be the purview of the new education minister, Siviwe Gwarube. 

The Bill has faced staunch criticism from the Democratic Alliance (DA), with party leader John Steenhuisen accusing Ramaphosa of violating “both the letter and spirit of the joint statement of intent that forms the basis of the government of national unity”.

The DA wants the Bill to be returned to parliament “because it has constitutional implications for the right to mother-tongue education, amongst other issues”, said Steenhuisen. 

Gwarube previously told the Mail & Guardian that she would adhere to her mandate and expeditiously implement “aspects” of the Bill should Ramaphosa sign it into law. 

“The Bill is the brainchild of the department that I lead and so if the president signs the Bill then we have to get on with the business of governing and implementing it,” Gwarube said. 

This comes in the wake of the Western Cape education department announcing that it plans to cut 2 400 teaching positions in January 2025. 

But when the Bill is made an Act, it would require more teachers to be hired to implement certain aspects, such as making grade R compulsory.  

In a statement after the announcement of the teacher cuts, Gwarube blamed the previous administration for “poor policy choices” which would lead to thousands of teachers being jobless. 

“These fiscal challenges stem from years of poor policy choices related to the management of our country. To emerge from this situation, we must make sound policy decisions and ensure better management of both government and the economy,” Gwarube said at an urgent meeting held by the Council of Education Ministers last week. 

In August, the Western Cape education department announced plans to cut 2 400 teaching jobs because of a severe budget cut of R3.8 billion.

The reduction in posts will mean that some contract teachers will not be reappointed after their contracts end on 31 December, and some permanent teachers will be asked to move to schools where there is a suitable vacancy.

The news about the job cuts led to an outcry from teacher unions, who threatened to take to the streets and file a case against the department and report it to the Education Labour Relations Council (ELRC) for lack of consultation. 

“This will not be accepted because the department hasn’t consulted in line with the legislation and we have declared a dispute. The matter will be scheduled by the ELRC in due course,” said the South African Democratic Teachers’ Union secretary, Mugwena Maluleke. 

The Good Party and the Western Cape legislature are scheduled to debate the matter on Thursday. 

There is no indication of how many teaching positions will be cut in other provinces, which are set to announce the number of posts for 2025 by 30 September. 

The Eastern Cape education department announced in a meeting last week with teaching unions that it plans to maintain 52 817 existing posts with “no retrenchments” for the next three years. 

During the budget speech in February, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana allocated R324.5 billion to basic education for the 2024-25 financial year, with additional money to cover teachers’ salaries.

Previously, in February 2023, the treasury allocated additional funds to the provincial education departments to pay teacher salaries. 

But, in the 2023 medium-term budget policy statement, the treasury acknowledged that budget pressures on education “could lead to larger class sizes and higher learner-teacher ratios, possibly resulting in weaker educational outcomes”.

Provincial education departments receive their Compensation of Employees budget allocation directly from the treasury, which is sent to the respective provincial treasuries. 

Provinces then act as employers independent of the department of basic education. Each provincial education department is responsible for managing its own human resource matters in coordination with its provincial treasuries.

But, when provincial departments start to take the strain, the ripple effect is felt across the national system. 

“This underscores the critical need for coordinated action to protect our education system,” read a statement by the basic education department. 

In April, Motshekga said her department has started recruiting people to fill the 31 000 teacher shortage in the country.

KwaZulu-Natal, at 7 044, recorded the highest number of unfilled posts followed by the Eastern Cape and Limpopo at 6 111 and 4 933, respectively. Northern Cape, at 726, has the least number of unfilled posts.

This is a 28% increase on the 24 000 vacancies recorded in 2021.

When asked by the M&G whether the department still plans on recruiting temporary teachers, Gwarube said she was “still assessing the situation”. 

A survey by the education department showed that, as of December 2023, 12 701 575 learners were enrolled in public schools with 409 488 educators in 22 511 schools across South Africa’s nine provinces. 

In 2023, a study by Stellenbosch University found that public schools have an average of 35 learners to one teacher — the maximum class size for foundation phase learners (grades R to four).

Early this year, the National Teachers Union raised the matter of a primary school offering grades one to seven and operated with only two teachers — one of whom served as principal.

Gwarube, since the teacher cut announcement, said she would approach the treasury to find ways to protect the education system from “painful budget cuts”.

The Governing Body Foundation has expressed its support for Gwarube’s plan for the provincial education departments to analyse the effect of the fiscal constraints. 

“National treasury may have to consider reprioritising expenditure to prevent the irreparable harm that would result from undermining the ability of schools to provide quality education,” said Anthea Cereseto, the chief executive of the foundation.

An uproar followed an earlier department statement about plans to cut 2 400 teaching jobs in the province as a result of a severe budget cut of R3.8 billion.

“We are not firing teachers, and we are not retrenching teachers,” Western Cape education MEC David Maynier said in the latest statement.

“The reduction in posts will mean that some contract teachers will not be reappointed after their contracts end on 31 December 2024, and some permanent teachers will be asked to move to another school where there is a suitable vacancy.”

Last week, the department said it had informed schools that “the current number of educator posts in the Western Cape cannot be maintained” and it had “cut down on spending across various directorates”. It said it had informed schools on where it planned to cut teacher posts. 

In the latest statement, Maynier said despite the department’s plan to implement a drastic R2.5 billion budget cut, including on administration, curriculum and infrastructure, it still faced a R3.8 billion budget shortfall over the next three years. 

“We are in an impossible position, and it is not of our making, and the Western Cape is not the only province affected.The decision by the national government to not fully fund the 2023 wage agreement has caused a fiscal crisis for education departments across the country,” he said.

South Africa’s public education system has 410 000 teachers employed in about 25 000 schools in the country, according to the Western Cape department.

In April last year, unions representing the majority of public servants at the Public Service Co-ordinating Bargaining Council accepted the government’s wage increase offer of 7.5% during the 2023-24 fiscal year.

But the Western Cape education department said it had received only 64% of the cost of the nationally negotiated wage agreement, leaving the province to fund the remaining 36%.

According to the South African Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu), the department began consultations with teacher unions and school governing bodies in July about its proposal to reduce the 2025 basket of educator posts.

Sadtu, the largest trade union for teachers in South Africa, has rejected the Western Cape department’s plans, saying it would report it to the Education Labour Relations Council (ELRC). 

“This will not be accepted because the department hasn’t consulted in line with the legislation and we have declared a dispute in the matter. The matter will be scheduled by the ELRC in due course,” said Sadtu secretary Mugwena Maluleke. 

The union confirmed that its members will embark on a strike on a date to be determined, taking into consideration the fact that matric exams are due to begin in October. 

Maynier’s Democratic Alliance, the party governing the Western Cape, said it would “fight for teachers affected by treasury’s funding shortfalls”. 

“The DA urges the national government to find alternative areas for budget cuts and to ensure that essential public service roles, including those of teachers, are fully protected.” DA basic education spokesperson Delmaine Christians said.

In the national budget, the department of basic education was allocated R32.3 billion for the 2024-25 financial year, a 7.4% increase from the 2023-24 budget allocation. 

Maynier noted that provinces had outlined the difficulties they were facing in presentations to the portfolio committee on basic education in the National Assembly on 20 August.

KwaZulu-Natal said its education department could not afford 11 092 of its educator posts because of its budget shortfall of R4 billion for 2024, and that it had to reduce norms and standards payments to schools and delay paying service providers.

“Mpumalanga has a budget pressure of R876 million that it must resolve, while the North West has to find R485 million.The Northern Cape has had to, according to the wording of their presentation to the portfolio committee, implement a ‘drastic removal of a large number of vacant posts’ from their organisational structure, but still won’t be able to deal with their shortfall,” Maynier said.

Gauteng said it would have to reduce learner transport, and would not be able to expand early childhood development as planned. The province has the second biggest education system in the country after Kwa Zulu-Natal, with more than 15 million pupils.

South Africa is already grappling with a 31 000 teacher shortage in the country. KwaZulu-Natal, at 7 044, recorded the highest number of unfilled posts followed by the Eastern Cape and Limpopo at 6111 and 4933, respectively. The Northern Cape, at 726, has the least number of unfilled posts.

The department, which in March cancelled Educor’s registration over its failure to submit audited financial statements since 2020, said the decision to reinstate it was made “purely on humanitarian grounds” after it was reported that more than 13 000 students registered at Educor institutions could be left stranded. 

It said the decision was made “with the primary aim of minimising the disruption to the education and future prospects of the students currently enrolled”.

Saftu had urged the department to ensure that the company “does not continue with the violation of workers’ rights and operates effectively to ensure the education services are delivered to the students who are registered”, spokesperson Trevor Shaku told the Mail & Guardian.

According to the Higher Education Act, private tertiary institutions are obliged to submit financial statements to the department as part of the accountability process. However, a private company is not required to disclose financial information to the public.

Educor, the largest private education provider in Southern Africa, owns the Damelin, CityVarsity, Icesa City Campus and Lyceum colleges. It manages 10 educational brands on more than 60 campuses and sites in South Africa and internationally.

As part of the conditions set out by the department of higher education, Educor must fully comply with Council on Higher Education accreditation requirements before commencing any teaching and learning activities. This includes an evaluation of the institution’s policies, systems, strategies and resources for quality management of the core functions of teaching and learning. 

Educor must also submit comprehensive monthly financial reports to the department, including detailed financial statements, student enrolment statistics and progress updates on compliance with Council on Higher Education accreditation standards.

Earlier this year, then higher education minister Blade Nzimande slammed Educor for its “gross governance and compliance failures” and gave it until December to “conclude the remaining examinations or assessments for the remainder of the current academic year”.

Saftu — which has been pushing for fair labour practices at the Educor colleges — said it had been receiving complaints about maladministration and the non-payment of salaries to employees at campuses nationwide since November 2023.

“Educor abused their lecturers and other staff in several ways, including late payment of wages, unilateral change of conditions of employment, firing workers who dared stand up for their rights and lacking basic functions that any employer is obliged to have in their workplaces, such as grievance mechanism and handling,” Shaku said. 

Despite the department’s decision to reinstate Educor’s registration, it warned that it reserved the right to revoke it should the company fail to adhere to the stipulated conditions.

“The provisional reinstatement does not in any way waive the department’s rights and powers entrusted to it in terms of the Higher Education Act or invalidate the legal proceedings that the parties were involved in,” it said.

A student at Damelin’s Braamfontein college told the M&G that, after months of uncertainty, the department’s decision had come as a relief.

“I’m glad the department decided to prioritise the students but we can only hope that the institution will do its part in adhering to the conditions,” the first-year accounting student said. 

A student at CityVarsity in Braamfontein also hailed the decision, adding that “private institutions offer you options that public universities often do not”.

“Schools actually have been really excellent in accommodating learners who require the use of certain bathrooms … but, of course, as the minister who is responsible for 13 and a half million learners, there are still learners who don’t have access to safe sanitation, so my priorities are wide-ranging to make sure that schools are safe for learners,” Gwarube said.  

She was responding to questions from the Mail & Guardian about the education department’s response to implementing policies to make the school environment a “gender-inclusive space” for all learners. 

The department has no guidelines on how to approach students who are sexually and gender diverse, for example, transgender learners, according to various groups and experts.  

“It all starts with the school, its teachers and its policies. Do students feel safe to express their gender identity? Not really. To what extent will they be protected by the school in terms of bullying and advocacy? It is unclear,” said Ronald Addinall, a clinic social worker at the University of Cape Town. 

Addinall, who was involved in the Western Cape education department’s draft regulations on gender identity and sexual orientation in 2020, said the province was experiencing an increase in children who were gender diverse and the national department did not have any clear policies, therefore a provincial body had to be established. 

He said the department had been “dragging its feet in adopting a framework to deal with sexual orientation in schools”. 

But according to basic education spokesperson Elijah Mahlangu, the department does have guidelines for teachers on how to approach learners who are gender diverse. He said it was parents who were divided. 

“There are many policies in the [education] sector that seek to address some of the social matters we encounter in the schooling system,” Mahlangu said. “There are individuals who hold dear to their beliefs and customs to the extent that their prejudices express themselves in public.” 

Because of this, he said the department had to balance its policies to benefit all learners. 

Gwarube said that creating a policy for learners who are gender inclusive would require the department to deliberate with stakeholders to ensure that there is a balanced approach to meeting their needs. 

“As a department, we need to occupy ourselves with how to evolve with the time and develop policies that speak specifically to learners that may be requiring different needs,” she said. “While we are doing that, we have to also balance that with the needs of other learners.” 

In 2023, the department started discussions on guidelines for socio-educational inclusion of diverse sexual orientation, gender identity, expression and sex characteristics.  

The department has given no updates about whether it will go ahead with the legislative process. 

Gender equality advocacy group Triangle Project has called on the department to take swift action in adopting guidelines. 

“The ongoing delay in rolling out the national [sexual orientation, gender identity, expression and sex characteristics] guidelines is a concern, especially since these guidelines are not new legislation but rather a consolidation of existing laws that require implementation,” said Juliana Davids, of the Triangle Project. 

 A 13-year-old learner at a rural school in Gauteng who is in a “transition period” and identifies as a boy, said his teachers help make him feel secure but he is afraid of what other learners will say if they find out. 

“It’s difficult — my teachers know and they are very supportive but I have to hide it from my classmates because I am afraid that I will be bullied, and maybe even sexually assaulted, because of who I am.” 

The teenager had to change schools after learners allegedly bullied him for being transgender. 

Cases similar to this often occur because teachers are not equipped to handle situations when a child identifies as transgender, the Triangle Project said. 

“While some teachers may have a basic understanding of gender issues, many lack the specific training,” Davids said. 

To mitigate gender discrimination, the department released the Early Childhood Education Gender Responsive Pedagogy toolkit, a practical guide for teachers aimed at “promoting gender equality in early childhood development” in May this year. 

The department said the toolkit would assist teachers in becoming aware of gender biases, enabling them to help children “break free from traditional stereotypes about gender that may limit their growth and development”. 

The toolkit was rejected by religious coalition For SA, which claims to represent more than 20 million Christians, Muslims and adherents of traditional African spirituality faiths.

The coalition warned that the guide “trains teachers to create a culture within pre-primary and primary schools [up to the age of nine] that conflicts with the norms and values regarding sex and gender that many parents hold and have the legal right to pass onto their children”.

A social worker at a rural school in the Western Cape, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said even though she has her personal views on the LGBT+ community, she does not allow it to prejudice her. 

“You have students in early grades who come in with fears and anxiety regarding their sexuality and, even though I have my personal opinions, I am not allowed to stereotype against this person but rather do my job as a social worker to ensure that the child feels safe and secure in the school,” she said. 

While the government determines the school curriculum, the school governing body (SGB) is mandated to implement the curriculum and adapt it to the values and needs of the specific school community. 

Gwarube said SGBs are important because they can make decisions based on the needs of the school. 

“You can’t set policies as a top-down approach and that’s why SGBs become very important,” she said. 

The Federation of Governing Bodies of South African Schools (Fedsas) believes that the collaborative efforts of the government and the SGBs can create “inclusive schools that respect and accommodate the diversity of all learners and staff”. 

But it mentions that there is a “gap” in the legislative framework that addresses how schools should approach learners who are transgender. 

“This gap in the legislative framework can create uncertainty for schools and SGBs as they strive to meet the needs of all learners,” said Juané van der Merwe, Fedsas’s chief executive and head of legal services.

The organisation added that multiple SGBs have asked it for guidelines on how to approach various aspects of gender identity, including toilets, dress codes and participation in school activities. 

Van der Merwe said Fedsas is “ working to provide SGBs with the necessary tools and guidelines to address these challenges in a manner that is both legally compliant and sensitive to the needs of all learners”.

Pinelands North Primary School is one of 15 public schools in South Africa that has changed its policies to include an “inclusive approach to learning”. 

Principal Ann Morton said the school had decided to become a “gender-neutral space” in 2008 after a mother approached the school asking whether her son could be identified as a girl. 

The school amended its admission, uniform and bathroom policies to allow for a safe environment where learners could “be themselves”. 

“We have lots of children who are gender different in our school. We had to look at everything that we did, all our policies that had any discrimination in it, we had to look at and say how can we do it differently,” Morton said. 

The school has had gender-neutral bathrooms since 2018.  

When asked whether the education department had adopted policies that fostered an inclusive school environment, Morton replied: “I don’t think so.”

Opposing voices 

But this sentiment is not shared by other primary schools. A principal at a primary school in Johannesburg’s northern suburbs said she didn’t agree that children as young as seven to 12 years old should be making decisions about their identity. 

“Children are born either a girl or a boy. I don’t want to confuse them any further — that is what they are and parents, teachers and the SGB are okay with this decision,” she said. 

According to the principal, who asked to remain anonymous, when parents begin the application process, some of them ask whether the school has adopted gender-neutral policies. “They are relieved when I tell them that I will not be adopting those policies at my school, I don’t care if I get fired — it goes against my beliefs” she said. 

A principal in Soweto said, even if the department made changes to its policies, places such as Soweto and other majority-black areas would not allow them to be implemented because of “ancestral beliefs”. 

“It is unfortunate but it is like that. At our school, nobody has come forward to say, ‘I want to identify as the opposite gender,’ because they are scared of what others will say, for which they will then get bullied. We can only do so much to protect a child at school and what about after school [hours]?” said the principal, who has more than 30 years of experience in education. 

Commenting on whether the department of education will propose guidelines on sexual orientation and gender identity, Gwarube said she was optimistic that policies would be developed to create “inclusive spaces”. 

“We have designed more complex policies before. You’ll recall at the dawn of democracy when we had to design policies that said that schools must be racially inclusive — that was a difficult time in our country but we did it. 

“So, I have no doubt in my mind that we will design a policy that is constructive, that can make sure that we’ve got inclusive spaces, but also that does not exclude voices in the entire sector,” she said.

“The Bill is the brainchild of the department that I lead and so if the president signs the Bill then we have to get on with the business of governing and implementing it,” Gwarube told the Mail & Guardian. 

Ramaphosa is considering the Bill, which has been subjected to minor adjustments after deliberations with stakeholders. 

The Bill was tabled by Gwarube’s predecessor, Angie Motshekga, and seeks to amend the South African Schools Act of 1996 and the Employment of Educators Act of 1998.

When the Bill passed in the National Council of Provinces on 15 May, the Democratic Alliance (DA), of which Gwarube is a member, argued that it went to the desk of the president without following parliamentary protocols. 

“The Bill hands extensive decision-making power to the heads of provincial basic education departments, diminishing the role of SGBs [school governing bodies] and local communities in determining language and admissions policies,” the DA’s representative on education, Baxolile Nodada, said at the time.

Gwarube told the M&G: “Of course, there are interested people now in the sector that maybe wish to oppose the Bill but my job now is a very different one. Now I have to make sure that I take aspects of it and implement it as quickly as possible should it be signed.”

“That is the role that I have as the minister of education. I can’t, when my department has crafted and tabled the Bill in parliament for deliberation, then run around and oppose the Bill.”

A key aspect of the Bill seeks to make grade R the compulsory school-starting grade and provides for penalties when parents fail to enrol their children. 

Gwarube said this is an aspect of the Bill that she would “like to see implemented”. 

The Bill also proposes measures to prevent the unnecessary disruption of schooling by protests or other causes, and to criminalise such actions. It will also introduce penalties for parents who keep their children out of school for extended periods.

The Bill addresses aspects of homeschooling, requiring parents to register their children with the department and specify the curriculum being used. It mandates independent assessments to monitor the children’s progress. 

It also offers an expansive definition of corporal punishment to include “any acts which seek to belittle, humiliate, threaten, induce fear or ridicule the dignity and person of a learner”. 

The Bill aims to revise the admission and language policies of schools by transferring decision-making authority from the school governing body to the head of department. This change was prompted by instances of discriminatory admission practices observed in some schools.

Gwarube said even though sections of the Bill have been met with “unhappiness from the sector” she believes “the president is well appraised by that and that he will apply his mind as the law dictates and he will sign the Bill or exercise his options”.

On Sunday, the department said it had launched an independent investigation into Pretoria High School for Girls “to determine whether a culture of racism exists at the school”. 

This comes after the school governing body found 12 learners not guilty of racism in relation to a “whites only” WhatsApp group which was allegedly used to share racist messages about black pupils.

The department will not investigate the 12 learners but rather allegations that racism exists at the school. 

“This decision is further motivated by the fact that the report of the [school governing body]’s ruling makes no mention of racism or discrimination against learners, whereas there has been a strong presumption of the existence of such at the school,” Gauteng education MEC Matome Chiloane said in a statement. 

The decision by the department follows a disciplinary hearing by a three-member panel, chaired by an advocate, with co-opted members of the school governing body.

The committee handed over the report to the governing body on Friday, which examined discussions on the WhatsApp group as part of the evidence presented against the pupils.

The school governing body said the content on the WhatsApp group was found to be “inconclusive and did not substantiate the charges of violence, bullying or disruptive behaviour”. It also cited inconsistencies in the testimonies given on the matter.

The provincial education department said it respected the role of the school governing body, saying the MEC could not “interfere with disciplinary proceedings involving learners unless a recommendation for expulsion is made to the HoD [head of department] and approved”.

The matter led to the department placing the school’s principal on precautionary suspension for 90 days, pending an investigation into allegations that she had ignored complaints of racism from learners. 

The saga came to light after pupils staged a protest, demanding that the school address the racism they said they faced.

In another matter, learners at the Jeppe High School for Girls have alleged racial discrimination after four black pupils were removed from their classroom for violating the institution’s hair policy.

One of the girls, who spoke to the Mail & Guardian on condition of anonymity, said the school principal had instructed her to leave class and sit in the library for the rest of the academic year because she had brown braids. 

The school updated its policy at the beginning of the 2024 academic year to stipulate that “hair must be the same colour from root to tip”.

But, the student alleged, in contrast to her experience, no measures were taken against a white learner who had highlights in her hair. 

“The white students who also had two colours in their hair were only reprimanded while we, the black girls, were sent to the library until we fixed our hair to match the school’s standard,” she said. 

The school referred the M&G to the Gauteng department of education for comment, saying it was not authorised to speak to the media directly. 

Gauteng education spokesperson Steve Mabona said he was aware of the incident and an investigation had been launched, adding: “Outcomes of our investigation will be communicated in due course.”

Gwarube, the former chief whip of the Democratic Alliance (DA), stressed that she would “not implement policies or programmes without evidence of their value in our concerted efforts to improve the quality outcomes of the system”.

The DA and other critics have previously slammed the performance of the basic education department, saying that the high matriculation pass rates often touted by Gwarube’s predecessor, Angie Motshekga, belied the poor quality of learning and high dropout rate in state schools.

In her speech on Monday, Gwarube said she would review the National Senior Certificate pass rate and other national systems to improve literacy and numeracy skills. 

“While there have been some improvements, our literacy and numeracy rates remain unacceptably low, [therefore] my team and I will obsess about getting learners at all levels in the system to be able to read for meaning,” she said. 

Gwarube said she would establish an advisory council representative of the basic education system as soon as possible. “This council, once up and running, will be an invaluable resource in ensuring that our efforts to strengthen our education system are targeted, evidence-based and informed by best practice.” 

Gwarube said the projection set by the department under her predecessor for a school governing body effectiveness of 50% of schools for 2024-25 was unacceptably low.

“This is nearly 30 years after the South African Schools’ Act was enacted. Given the critical role of school governing bodies in relation to much of what our public schools do, this is simply not good enough. We must do better,” she said.

Education experts say school governing bodies are key to shaping the educational environment — from the curriculum and school policies to infrastructure management and staff appointments.

According to the education department, schools with high school governing body participation have reported an average 20% higher pass rate than those with lower involvement.

School governing body elections ran from 1 to 31 March 2024 in all public schools. By law, the department is required to hold elections every three years.

The medium-term expenditure framework budget allocation for the department for 2024-25 is R32.3 billion, an increase of 7.4% from the 2023-24 overall allocation. 

The overall allocation for conditional grants is R26.041 billion – an increase of 10.4% from 2023-24. This includes an allocation of R13.7 billion to advance school infrastructure delivery as part of the Sanitation Appropriate for Education Initiative.

Parents, schools and civil society organisations have raised the alarm about the department not tackling dilapidated school infrastructure. 

In a statement after Gwarube’s appointment, rights group Equal Education said exploring mechanisms to improve the quality and efficiency of infrastructure delivery for the sector across the country “is something that should be prioritised”.

The department’s 2013 School Infrastructure Regulations provided clear deadlines — November 2016, 2020, 2023 and 2030 — by which public schools should be provided with basic infrastructure such as water, electricity, classrooms, toilets and fencing. It also required that all schools constructed from inappropriate materials such as mud, asbestos, metal or wood be fixed by November 2016. 

But the department has on numerous occasions failed to meet deadlines to provide appropriate school facilities, according to Equal Education.

On Monday Gwarube said she planned to review the recently published norms and standards for school infrastructure to “drive meaningful improvements”.

“We cannot have learners in danger of drowning in pit toilets or learning in inappropriate structures, 30 years into our democracy,” she said. 
In June, Motshekga signed a revised prescription of the School Infrastructure Regulations, which give provincial education departments the authority to determine how school infrastructure projects should be prioritised and when they should be completed.

But there are initiatives addressing this, and one of the key developments is the national expansion of the annual internship led by the National Institute for Theoretical and Computational Sciences (NITheCS) for final year and postgraduate students, with an emphasis on those from historically disadvantaged universities.

For the past 16 years the internship has been led by Stellenbosch University with a handful of participating universities. It proved its worth and in September 2023 the department of science and innovation and the National Research Foundation approved the development of a national NITheCS consortium, led by Stellenbosch University with 25 South African universities forming five nodes. 

“Now that we have a national mandate, our aim is to exponentially increase the number of mathematically, analytically and numerically skilled individuals in South Africa in both higher education and industry to advance the knowledge-based economy,” says Professor Francesco Petruccione, the director of NITheCS at Stellenbosch University.

“It will strengthen the research capacity needed to solve the major challenges we are facing, including energy, water, health, food security, climate change and growing the economy. It will increase our global competitiveness in science and technology, and in the rapid development of artificial intelligence,” Petruccione says.

Doctoral student at the University of Cape Town, Aluwani Guga, participated in the internship after completing his Honours in Physics at the University of Venda in Limpopo. 

“The reason I’m currently doing my doctorate in physics is because of the NITheCS internship,” he says, “It shaped my understanding of theoretical and computational physics and helped me to grasp complex concepts — from the behaviour of subatomic particles to the vastness of the cosmos. During the internship I realised how much I wanted to be a nano-materials researcher,” says Guga who aims to complete his doctorate in December 2024. 

He did his internship at Nelson Mandela University in December 2018, supervised by Professor Azwinndini Muronga and Dr Mohammed Younus, both theoretical physicists. Muronga is the executive dean of the Faculty of Science and he annually hosts the largest number of interns, currently about 35.

Muronga says the internship also helps to advance postgraduates to the level required to participate in South African-based international science programmes such as at the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), SA-CERN and iThemba LABS, and in programmes with their international partners such as the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Italy. 

“We need to make sure that we have a strong and growing pipeline of South African scientists contributing to these programmes and applying themselves to future discoveries,” he says.

The internship includes eight themes: theoretical physics, mathematics, statistics, astronomy and astrophysics, data sciences, quantitative finance, bioinformatics and quantitative biology, earth systems and climate change modelling. 

“The internship widened my horizons and provided the doorway for me to pursue my PhD at Wits,” says Dr Thuthukile Khumalo who did her BSc, honours and master’s in chemistry and physics at the University of Zululand. She attended the internship during her master’s and graduated with her doctorate in experimental nuclear physics from the University of the Witwatersrand in April 2024. “I want to be an academic as I have a passion for teaching and research,” she says.  

Keletso Monareng participated in the internship at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research in Pretoria, supervised by Dr David Tshwane, a senior researcher in computational science at the CSIR.

Monareng says: “I am a brilliant mind pursuing my PhD in physics at the University of Limpopo, applying machine learning techniques to design and discover new materials. This is a cutting-edge application of artificial intelligence that has the potential to revolutionise the way we predict materials properties and develop new and functional materials.” She has a BSc  in physics and chemistry, honours in physics and Master Science from the University of Limpopo.

“We are all assigned a research project as part of the internship and it’s a great way to keep abreast of the latest advancements, in my case in materials science, which is super important in such a rapidly evolving field.” 

Intern Lutho Booi did his BSc at the University of the Western Cape, his honours in astrophysics at the University of Cape Town and is now doing his master’s in astrophysics and space science.

“During my internship at Nelson Mandela University, I learnt that with computational skills I can move into other fields like finance; it opened my mind to many options or to stay with astrophysics and take it much further at facilities like the SKA, which will offer increasing opportunities for astrophysicists and data analysts.

“I have decided astrophysics is my path because I am so interested in the universe and I want to focus on transient astronomy and supernovae explosions or binary systems. Scientifically I think I can make a huge difference to the field in South Africa and globally.”

His interest in the universe started with debates about whether God exists. “Researching astrophysics and space science, I learnt so much about the universe and started exploring how we came to be living on Earth, and about life and death at the universal scale,” he says. “I want to understand how the universe works and what happened after the Big Bang. I can say there is some big creative force and we can prove it scientifically but I am still learning and seeking answers to all these questions.”

Muronga says the most important aspect of the programme is it teaches the interns to be independent thinkers and problem-solvers. “It’s a very tough learning curve for them and they experience many frustrations and trials but it prepares them for the highest levels of research and to succeed in the world of work.

“I am motivated by what we can achieve through NITheCS as I know where many of our students, postgraduates and researchers come from. I know the difficulties they face.” 

He explains that when he did his master’s at the University of Cape Town he had no computational skills as these were not available at the University of Venda when he did his undergraduate and honours degree there. 

“When I went to the University of Cape Town to do my master’s and PhD, I had to teach myself computational skills. All these years later, we still get students attending the internship without programming skills and we have to teach them these. It is unacceptable. Computational and data science languages should all be taught in every university curriculum. Many of the students from historically disadvantaged universities have also not been exposed to current research trends. This should not be the case.”

Intern Thapelo Ntobeng recently graduated with his MSc in physics at the University of Limpopo. “I did the internships at the University of KwaZulu-Natal because I wanted to push beyond my comfort zone, and to meet and exchange ideas with other people in my field of theoretical and computational condensed matter and materials physics.

“Through the internship I have gained essential computing experience.I learnt so much from my supervisor, Dr Aniekan Ukpong, a senior lecturer in physics, and researcher in theoretical and computational condensed matter and materials physics. This helped to determine my career path which is to be a researcher in materials physics.”

Intern Simamkele Kalipa is doing her honours in applied mathematics at Nelson Mandela University. She did her BSc at the same university. 

“My research project focus is on machine learning for climate dataset analysis, and during the internship I learnt to do data analysis at a high level. It also helped me to clarify which career path I wish to pursue which is to be a computational mathematician. I want to create models and simulations of real world situations, such as to determine water flow which is essential in urban infrastructure.”

Petruccione says: “There are many inspiring stories about how the NITheCS internships have propelled the academic journeys and careers of young scientists. With the national NITheCS consortium, we are aiming to significantly increase this. We need to make sure that we have a strong and growing pipeline of young data and basic scientists applying themselves to research and innovation that advances the boundaries of human knowledge and understanding of our world and universe, and that pushes the frontiers of science and technology for the benefit of society.”

“The Gauteng department of education acknowledges the findings of this report and is committed to implementing the recommended remedial actions,” the department’s spokesperson, Steve Mabona, said.  

The public protector’s investigation, released at the end of June, found that the conduct of the functionaries of the two departments “did not comply with the applicable legal prescripts and procedures regulating procurement or supply chain management processes during the construction of Mayibuye Primary School”. 

The investigation originates from a complaint lodged by Build One South Africa’s (Bosa’s) leader, Mmusi Maimane, in September 2020, who said the school was constructed on an old sewer line, because a wetland study was not conducted. 

According to the complaint, the Gauteng infrastructure department spent R82 million to build the school for 1 200 primary school learners. 

But it was only after the school was completed that a wetland investigation was conducted by the infrastructure department, which discovered a sewer line that had been leaking for years. 

The report, issued under section 182(1)(b) of the Constitution and section 8(1) of the Public Protector Act, found that the improper construction resulted in “overspending, cost overruns and undue delays in completing the project”.

The Gauteng department of agriculture and rural development and environment had no record of an application for environmental authorisation, according to the report.

It is “immaterial at this stage whether the wetland is natural or artificial”, said the report,  due to the leaking sewer being the main hydrological driver of the wetland because of possible human activities or disturbances that took place on the site. 

The condition of the area still warrants rehabilitation or mitigating engineering solutions, according to the report. 

The public protector also found that there were shortcomings and irregularities during the tender procurement process. The report details how the school contractor, Basic Blue/Nebavest, was appointed by the infrastructure department on 22 August 2015, but the “permission to occupy” the site was obtained on 22 September 2016, from the landowner, the City of Johannesburg — 13 months after the contract was awarded. 

The report further states that the education department amended the scope of the contract four days after the contractor was appointed to include, among other things, “smart school” requirements. This required additional funding from the provincial treasury, resulting in increased costs and further delays in getting approvals.  

The handing over of the site to the contractor was also unduly delayed, which took place on 12 May 2017. As a direct result of the delays, the infrastructure and education departments had to pay compensation events (CEs) to the value of R10 060 519.73 to the contractor for “standing time”. 

“Poor project management by the GDE [Gauteng department of education] and GDID [Gauteng department of infrastructure development] resulted in their inability to identify shortcomings that existed on the site such as the revision of the scope of the project by GDE to incorporate smart school’s requirements,” reads the report. 

According to the infrastructure department’s internal investigation, findings by the Auditor General of South Africa (AGSA) and the Gauteng treasury confirmed that there was irregular expenditure caused by poor contract management and planning by departments’ officials. 

“This irregular expenditure flagged by GDID’s internal investigation, AGSA and GPT [Gauteng provincial treasury] is also in direct violation of sections 38(1)(ii) and 45(c) of the PFMA [Public Finance Management Act],” the report found. 

The public protector said the infrastructure department must provide a project plan within 60 days of the implementation of its external civil works. 

The project plan must indicate how and when the completion of the remaining external civil works will be finalised to ensure the school is fully operational in line with efficient and economic management of the funds. 

The project plan should be in terms of section 38(1)(c)(iii) of thePFMA, which will enable learners to use all the facilities at the school in 2024. 

Bosa said its member in the provincial legislature, Ayanda Allie, has written to Premier Panyaza Lesufi to establish a multi-party task team from the legislature to oversee the implementation of the public protector’s remedial action. 

“We are of the view that the remedial action is flimsy and deficient and illustrates how far this matter is away from being settled. All efforts must be made to recover the funds spent otherwise shady contractors and compromised government employees get away scot-free,” said Bosa’s spokesperson, Graham Charters. 

The education department has, over the years, faced scrutiny of its handling of the provincial treasury to improve school infrastructure. 

In February, the Mail & Guardian reported the Gauteng education department was apparently complicit in dysfunctional schools abusing state funds in the “squandering” of R10 million in three years at KwaDukathole Comprehensive School in Katlehong, Ekurhuleni.

Witnesses said KwaDukathole schoolchildren had to arrive by at least 6am to book a seat and if they arrived late they had to use bricks and rocks as chairs. 

Earlier this year, learners at Durban Deep Primary near Roodepoort reported having to learn in decaying classrooms and use dilapidated toilets. There was also stable electricity supply.

This comes despite a 2023 statement by the Democratic Alliance (DA) in Gauteng accusing the MEC for education, Matome Chiloane, of misleading the public by claiming that the school would be completed by the end of March 2023.

In 2023, a four-month investigation by amaBhungane revealed that Gauteng’s education and infrastructure departments sold off the functional Phoenix Secondary School in Duncanville in Vereeniging in 2001, along with a 27-hectare land parcel for R600 000. 

In 2022, the DA raised the alarm on the abandoned construction site of the Nancefield Primary School in Eldorado Park — two years after construction began. Learners had to use cramped mobile classrooms. 

According to Gauteng finance MEC Jacob Mamabo, the education department will receive R65.8 billion for 2024-25 and a total of R205.9 billion over the 2024 Medium Term Expenditure Framework for education and skills development. 

The social justice movement, Equal Education (EE), said the treasury has limited the quality of education. 

“Reduced spending per learner means one of two things: either the quality of education will suffer or the number of learners provided with schooling will need to go down. Neither of these options should be allowed,” the EE said in a statement after Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s budget speech in February.

Gauteng’s education department told the Mail & Guardian it was reviewing school infrastructure and will implement changes, as needed. 

The report, released on Wednesday and spearheaded by social justice group Section27, says climate change has reduced educational attainment in various ways, such as damage to school infrastructure from extreme weather such as floods. 

The sector has been indirectly affected through food insecurity, air pollution and health, the report adds.

“Yet the basic education sector is hardly involved in climate change discourse when it is directly influencing the future leaders of our country,” Tatiana Kazim, a senior legal researcher at Equal Education Law Centre, said at the report’s launch.

The report also mentions heat exposure in schools, especially in mobile classrooms and those built from inappropriate materials that trap heat such as prefabricated sheeting and corrugated iron roofs. 

“The use of these materials, coupled with poor ventilation and overcrowding, results in very hot classrooms, which in turn results in poor educational attainment,” it says.

Studies have shown that learners writing examinations in classrooms with a temperature of 30°C scored 20% lower in tests compared with those in classrooms with a temperature of 20°C. 

The heat led to drowsiness, poor concentration and thirst, as reported by the affected students.

Another vulnerability of the education system identified by the report is dilapidated school infrastructure that cannot withstand the effects of flooding and severe storms. The April 2022 floods in KwaZulu-Natal are an example of the devastating effects of climate change on school infrastructure. During this period, more than 630 schools were damaged.

The destruction of roads also prevented many learners from going to school.

In one of the cases Section27 is litigating, schools in Limpopo that are in a severely dilapidated state as a result of longstanding lack of maintenance and storm damage were promised renovations and refurbishments by the Limpopo department of education. 

One of these schools has been waiting for these repairs since 2012. 

“The increased occurrence of extreme weather events is anticipated, and these school buildings are unlikely to survive floods and severe storms, resulting in a safety risk to learners and extended periods during which learners will not be able to attend school,” Motheo Brodie, an attorney at Section27, said during the launch of the report. 

Based on the Norms and Standards for School Infrastructure gazetted by the government in 2013 and amended by Basic Education Minister Angie Motshega in 2022, dilapidated infrastructure should have been completed by November 2023. 

“These conditions make the basic education system in South Africa particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change,” said Kazim. 

In August 2023, the education department reported that 3  932 public schools still had pit toilets on school premises and 728 schools used only pit toilets.

The Committee on the Rights of the Child says the climate emergency, the collapse of biodiversity and pervasive pollution are “an urgent and systemic threat to children’s rights globally”, a view echoed by Section27 in its report on addressing the climate risks for schools. 

“Like most vulnerable groups, children are vulnerable due to their position in society, but they also face vulnerability due to their unique metabolism, physiology, and developmental needs,” it says.

To mitigate these issues, the report says schools must be designed to be more climate-resilient, with infrastructure constructed from appropriate materials.

It calls on the department of basic education to put systems in place for remote learning to ensure the continuity of the educational programme in the aftermath of extreme weather events, especially in cases where schools may be inaccessible because schools and roads have been damaged.