Major inferiority within South African schooling system

Tichakura Manyeres Secondary School decided to spend its 67 minutes to commemorate Nelson Mandela Day prior to July 18. While we busied our lives with errands and had lunch with friends, the learners and teachers of Tichakura Manyeres spent their Saturday painting walls, fixing broken doors and spring-cleaning classrooms.

We can debate the issue that a person’s environment determines his outcome. But if you think about the condition in which these learners are educated, is it conducive to learning? Would you want your child to receive an education from one of these schools? Yet someone else’s child attends one of these schools.

Corporate South Africa informs us that they support and provide funding towards education. While we agree with them, it begs the question: Where do they feed their Corporate Social Investments? Are the schools well resourced?

TEACH South Africa’s programme has interventions in four provinces in South Africa. There are 13 schools in Gauteng, 11 in Limpopo, six in the Western Cape and one in the Eastern Cape. Ninety percent of these schools, where we have placed TEACH Ambassadors, are under-resourced.

The TEACH South Africa programme provides quality teachers at these schools. But if an impact from our intervention is to be measurable, we need partnerships and sponsors to enable the environment in which we want our learners to succeed to be fully operational.

When you look at images of extreme conditions some learners have to endure in order to be educated, how is it possible for them to learn? The conditions of township and rural schools are shocking. Why? Because nobody cares to know why.

It is up to the private sector and the community to contribute towards the education in these forgotten schools if we wish to witness the progression of South Africa’s economy.