The Department of Education’s (DoE) release of the Review of the Financing, Resourcing and Costs of Education in Public Schools this month has acknowledged some important weaknesses in the education system.
The review, conducted last year, aims to improve efficiency and outcomes of education resourcing policies for public schools in the country.
One key weakness identified is the inability of provinces to translate their budgets into actual resources that reach schools.
A recommendation is that a budget monitoring and support office be established to improve this capacity.
According to the Minister of Education Kader Asmal, ‘Such a facility will vastly improve our monitoring capacity, which will, in turn, improve our capacity to identify and resolve problems at an early stage and to hold accountable those officials who have been able to disregard their responsibilities with impunity.â€
The review indicates that poor systems and business processes, and the ineffectiveness of some officials, are responsible for the failure to give schools resources. ‘We will not countenance a situation where people are deprived of resources because of a lack of commitment, the absence of a sense of mission and a disregard of the government’s programme of batho pele, people first,†Asmal threatens.
Educators and principals who marginalise poor learners and disregard their dignity were also lambasted, and may face legal action. The review highlighted the fact that parents are made to pay 25% more on top of school fees – besides the ‘hidden costs†of uniforms and textbooks – to fund teachers’ perks. The report has thus recommended an improved monitoring of fees charged in public schools.
‘We will not tolerate a situation where learners are deprived of their dignity and full access to education on account of an inability to pay school fees. We will not tolerate a situation where parents who can afford to pay school fees are exploited to fund unfair pricing practices, inputs unrelated to the improvement of education quality and additional pecuniary benefits for principals and state employed educators,†Asmal says.
He described the review as ‘more fundamentally concerned with the rights of the child. It is concerned with the highest priority of this government: of pushing back the frontiers of povertyâ€.
It further recommends that poor learners, particularly in the General Education and Training band, be given a nourishing school lunch everyday. ‘Firstly, well-nourished learners perform better in the classroom. Secondly, school meals are an incentive for poor parents to ensure that their children attend school every day,†the report says.
A further recommendation intended to benefit the poorest children was also put forward. In the current funding mechanism, each province compiles its own resource-targeting tables that are constructed according to the relative levels of poverty within their own province. This was found to be prejudicial to learners in poorer provinces. To rectify this, the review recommends the introduction of a national targeting system that will ensure that learners who are equally poor receive the same amount of funding regardless of the province they live in.
The National Professional Teachers’ Organisation of South Africa states that it ‘welcomes the proposal to change the funding norms to have a national resource targeting emphasis. This will ensure that common criteria will be used across the country with regard to funding of schools.â€
Other recommendations in the review include: negotiations with relevant stakeholders to lower the prices of school inputs such as uniforms and textbooks; the development of a coherent transport system for learners who travel long distances, often by foot; and strengthening the reward system for professional excellence.
‘We welcome the report. It is long overdue and some recommendations are far reaching. Where they are not, we will obviously make inputs,†says Hassen Lorgat of the South African Democratic Teachers’ Union.
The report is open for public comment until April 21 2003.