Kader Asmal says teachers are under-prepared for the changes in Curriculum 2005 and the changes in governance outlined in the South African Schools Act
Speaking at the launch of the University of Natal’s new Faculty of Education last month, Minister of Education Kader Asmal said it was crucial to establish education as a respected first choice field of academic study.
Asmal noted that the incorporation of the former Edgewood College of Education into the University of Natal was part of a new beginning for teacher education that “has at its centre the recognition that improving the quality of teacher training is crucial for the transformation of the education system”.
Asmal said it was a myth of outcomes-based education that there was no need for subject teaching. “Teacher education must improve the lack of subject knowledge, which is a crucial weakness in the current training of secondary school teachers.
“Although it is important to address the apartheid-induced inequalities in relation to material resources and infrastructure, it is clear that providing schools with adequate classrooms, electricity, water, toilets and so forth will not in itself result in transformation of the education system. It has to be accompanied by improving the quality and professionalism of our teachers,” added Asmal.
Another challenge was to retrain and upgrade the existing teacher corps. The University of Natal would pilot the National Professional Diploma in Education, “the key instrument for the upgrading of the 67 000 under-qualified teachers”.
Large numbers of new teachers were needed. “We are back in recruitment mode. Each year we lose more than 17 500 teachers through natural attrition and we are only training 2 500 students each year.”
“Given current projections, and the impact of HIV/Aids, it is clear that teacher education students will form a significant percentage of the overall number of higher education students [at some institutions], likely to rise to 30% or more of total enrolment,” he said.
“We are seeking to recruit the brightest and the best and we have ring-fenced funding specifically dedicated to teacher education within the National Student Financial Aid Scheme.”
The minister said he had instructed that the funds would be available to disadvantaged students of all races.
While the government would seek creative ways of providing incentives for potential students, educators had to play a role in helping to restore the status of teachers and teaching as a profession.
Asmal said that as part of improving the status of education as a discipline, higher education institutions had to help build “a sound research platform” in the discipline, where the research agenda was “wide open”.
– The Teacher/M&G Media, Johannesburg, September 2001.