Long-awaited legislation to allow schools cheaper access to the Internet has been approved — more than four years after the Department of Education and the Department of Communications introduced the idea in a policy document. A bungle involving the departments and telephony parastatal Telkom has delayed the introduction of an e-rate, a discounted rate for Internet services.
A Montessori school in Midrand, north of Johannesburg, has been accused of operating illegally. The independent school, which offers classes from nursery to junior primary, is also alleged to have problems with hygiene, security and parking. The school denies the allegations, claiming that some parents simply have "an axe to grind".
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/ 22 February 2006
Experts and practitioners involved in early childhood development have raised serious concerns about the government’s lack of early childhood interventions in the years preceding Grade R. Their main gripe is that, despite compelling international evidence that the provision of ECD education plays a significant role in preparing children for schooling in their formative stages, the government continues to focus the available ECD resources on Grade R.
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/ 24 January 2006
The Eastern Cape sprung a surprise on the country by being the only province to record an improvement in its 2005 matric results. The province’s performance rose from 53,5% to 56,7%. The results in other provinces, however, showed a decrease, dragging the national figures down from a 70,7% pass rate in 2004 to 68,3% last year.
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/ 12 January 2006
Johannesburg’s only school for learners with poor sight or multiple disabilities runs more on determination than hard cash. Bronwen Jones founded the Johannesburg School for Blind, Low Vision and Multiple Disability Children – also known as Beka – in Auckland Park in 2003.
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/ 12 January 2006
A looming financial crisis is threatening the survival of an independent centre of education excellence in rural Limpopo.
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/ 5 December 2005
Mixed reports are coming in about school and teacher readiness to implement the New Curriculum Statement (NCS) for grades 10 to 12 next year. While most agree that the NCS is an improvement on the old curriculum, poor teacher training and delays in the distribution of new learning materials for these grades have been identified as problematic.
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/ 30 November 2005
Your average youngster who’s hip to the beat of R&B and kwaito may not think there is any possibility of forging a relationship with classical music. Classical music, the youth are most likely to believe, is only suitable for rich, ageing Eurocentrics.
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/ 22 November 2005
Parktown Girls’ High School, north of Johannesburg, this month says goodbye to five out-of-the-ordinary Grade 12s. The school enrolled five deaf learners in 2001, but has been forced to decline any further applications from disabled learners because the cost of teaching them is prohibitive.
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/ 11 November 2005
In the face of widespread poverty in rural Mpumalanga, some schools serve as the glue in an environment where family units are disintegrating. They provide much-needed comfort and sustenance to orphans and children with poverty-stricken parents.