"Business sector distressed at the state of education in the Eastern Cape"

01 Feb 2016 | Admin Author

The Border Kei Chamber of Business says its deeply concerned about the state of education in the province.

The Chamber, which represents big business in the Border Kei region, says its clear that the Department of Education has over the past 10 years declined.

It says although in recent years there has been some semblance of improvement, this has been insignificant.

Chamber CEO, Les Holbrook, says they note with concern that both national and provincial government seem to believe that they can solve the problems by throwing money at it.

Read the full Chamber statement below:

It is with great concern that the Border-Kei Chamber of Business on behalf of the organised business sector makes its position clear on the dire state of education in the Eastern Cape Province and the devastating consequences thereof should the status quo continue unabated.

It is clear that the Department of Education has over the past 10 years certainly declined, although in recent years there has been some semblance of improvement, however insignificant.

The strongest indicator that we currently have to measure the quality of education is the annual matric results. In 2012 the Eastern Cape was the worst performing province in the country, with only 61% of matriculants passing and only 17% obtaining a university entrance pass. Children who fail matric impact exponentially on the youth unemployment crisis which is a serious threat to socio-economic stability and growth.

The Border Kei Chamber of Business states explicitly that the quality of education is currently unacceptable to us as a key stakeholder. The lack of quality education is directly evident in the calibre of candidates entering the workplace as they leave the school system.

Should this trend continue, the current skills shortages being experienced in the region will increase and render us uncompetitive and further entrench negative economic growth patterns in this province.

It is our view that the following key issues need to be addressed as a matter of urgency in order to remedy the current status quo of education in the province:

*The urgent allocation of sufficient numbers of correctly qualified teachers to schools must be addressed. This will deal with the serious issues pertaining to curriculum knowledge gaps and normalise teacher to learner ratios. The Chamber finds it unacceptable that there are some children who do not have teachers and it is equally unacceptable that there are teachers who have disproportionally high numbers of children in their classrooms.

*The Department of Education needs to actively and in good faith engage with teacher unions in an effort to resolve issues that negatively impact on teaching and learning. In equal measure unions need to place the interests of learners at the forefront of their negotiations and actively seek to resolve challenges.

*School principals are key to improving the quality of education and Business calls upon the Department of Education to provide the required support to these critical role players.

*It is our contention that there are serious management and administration inefficiencies within Department of Education which need to be identified and urgently addressed.

Business is acutely aware that the Department of Education is not able to achieve all of these necessary objectives alone and as such extends a helping hand to the Department in this regard.

Business needs to and is willing to be involved in this process and wants to be taken seriously in the offer of assistance in identifying and providing solutions in certain aspects.

While we recognise that pockets of excellence exist within the education system, we believe that where these are properly identified and recognised, they can be extended and replicated to support dysfunctional aspects of the education system.

Excellence and the raising of standards should be strongly promoted and supported across all spheres of society, particularly in the education sector.
Investor confidence is inextricably linked to education.

Should the province and the Border-Kei region in particular wish to be recognised internationally as an attractive investment destination, the issues raised above need to be considered as a matter of urgency.

The business sector as a whole has huge concerns about the future of education in the Province and note that in order to grow the province to an economic hub and in turn increasing its penchant for attracting investors, the state of education needs to be urgently addressed.