Yusuf Omar
It’s a bizarre blame game at Jabulani Technical High School, infamous for obtaining the worst matric results in Gauteng last year.
Results came out on January 5, but pupils collected their grades only yesterday.
“They are too embarrassed,” said school governing body chairman Boniwe Xulu.
He said the school had a 32 percent pass rate in 2010 that had declined drastically to 16 percent in 2011, with just 33 passes from 209 pupils.
“Some of the teachers are a serious concern,” he said.
“They are not passionate about teaching. But the principal can’t even fire them, only recommend to the departments of education and labour that they be dismissed.
“I believe the learners who passed were going to pass even if there were no teachers. They worked themselves hard. It’s a two-way traffic.”
Xulu suggested a strategy to turn the school’s results around: “Teachers need to be assessed better. They may be good academics but not good teachers.”
Matriculant Sandile Mabiba, who is one of just two pupils at the school with a university entrance, was returning the textbook Nothing But the Truth, a play written by thespian John Kani, in exchange for
his school report.
“We got new textbooks, ample stationery and good teachers,” he said. “It’s easy to blame the school, but it’s the learners who didn’t perform,” said Mabiba.
Milton Rakola, 18, was one of the top five matriculants at the school. “I took extra classes and worked really hard. It’s the students that are the problem. At this school we have everything,” he said.
Xolani Zwane, a school mate, agreed. “The government pumped resources into this school, but the learners didn’t take the opportunity. The problem is maths and science especially,” he said.
“A lot of students don’t even attend class. There are too many holes (in the fence) for them to escape during the day.
Thabang Ngubane, who didn’t pass, said: “The school is good, we just didn’t work hard enough.”
Maths tutor Tebogo Zikhali, visiting the school to assess some of the problems, said the problems start at home.
He said parents were largely uneducated – so couldn’t help with homework – and teachers had to teach the basics because “they didn’t get a well-rounded pupil from the lower grades”.
Gauteng Department of Education spokesman Charles Phahlane said the department would conduct an in-depth analysis of schools which performed below 40 percent.
He said the department had implemented additional interventions at Jabulani Technical High, including extra classes on Saturdays and holidays and a special camp in the lead-up to exams, but nothing had helped.