Yesterday, the Standing Committee on Education received a presentation by the Western Cape Education Department on a thorough analysis of the 2019 National Senior Certificate results. Despite the challenges highlighted by the Department, it was revealed that the overall pass rate for ten Special Schools increased from approximately 87% in 2018 to 92% in 2019, an incredible 5% improvement.
“Special schools are founded to ensure that learners with special needs have the opportunity to receive quality education, respective to their individual needs. It is therefore incredible that nearly 50% of candidates in special schools passed with access to a Bachelor’s Degree programme and that progress is made to towards the promise of quality education to every learner in every classroom,” MPP Lorraine Botha said.
The Western Cape Education Department however, needs to accommodate approximately 23 000 additional mainstream learners during the current academic year, which equates to a need for 23 new schools in the province.
MPP Loraine Botha added: “The resource gap has been presented as a prominent challenge hampering quality performance in the Western Cape. I will thus take the matter of skewed funding of the quintile system to the Provincial Budget Committee to discuss strategies on how we can address the critical need for more money for education in the Western Cape as this problem continues to persist year on year.”
The Democratic Alliance in the Western Cape will explore every avenue towards providing quality education for all learners in our province as we remain committed to continuously improve strategies in order for educational outcomes to be qualitative achievements.