Tag Archives: Department of Education

Education department welcomes Metcalfe’s report

Written by Nthambeleni Gabara The Department of Education has welcomed the report compiled by Professor Mary Metcalf into the delivery of textbooks to Limpopo schools. It says that the report adequately captures the complexities of the Section 100 (1)(b) intervention in that province and the difficulties experience by national government in terms of the provision [...]

Basic Education Budget Vote Speech by Angie Motshekga

I thank you for the privilege to present our Budget Vote speech. This indeed affords the National Department of Basic Education a platform formerly to account for activities of 2011/12. We will also present the Department’s policy priorities and strategic response to key government tasks as outlined by President Jacob Zuma in the 2012 State of the Nation Address. Minister Blade Nzimande did remind this House during the Budget Vote Debate for Higher Education that: “Education now constitutes more than 21 per cent of Government’s total allocated expenditure for the 2012/13 financial year”.

From the perspective of an angry teacher

I am sitting in a sparsely-furnished office at a local township school, engaged in a conversation with the Head of Department for the Humanities, to join me for a scheduled “one-on-one”. My eyes dart around. Files and books and papers here, flip charts and pictures there. Okay, no surprises here. Except the famed picture on the wall depicting Mbuyisa Makhubu carrying the dying Hector Peterson, with the crying Antoinette Sithole alongside him.

Are South African teachers lazy?

What really constitutes an advantaged and a disadvantaged school though? Is an advantaged school one where you walk into every classroom and see an interactive whiteboard and a laptop in front of every learner? Is an advantaged school one that is built out of bricks and has airconditioning, electricity and running water? When will the South African Department of Education realise that good education starts with the teacher?