IN the wake of COP26, decisive action was taken by the South African government to concretise its commitment to the just energy transition (JET) – a move towards a sustainable, low-carbon and equitable energy system – as a national imperative.

On the positive side, major players in the local energy sector have followed suit, joining the fray of South African industry leaders who have demonstrated their support of this mandate, says domestic appliances manufacturer Defy Appliances CEO Mustafa Soylu.

However, he points out that, as the drive towards a more sustainable future accelerates, it is clear that skilled workers within the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) industries are needed, who are equipped to design, develop, execute and manage renewable energy programmes.

“Our country faces a widening divide in terms of wealth and opportunity. This is a gap that training and education can serve to bridge, particularly in STEM careers that are characterised by their ability to pay a living wage, thus tackling poverty,” he says.

Soylu says that upskilling within this field is of particular relevance within the country’s unique socioeconomic context, with South Africa notoriously having the highest Gini coefficient in the world.

However, Soylu emphasises that there is certainly no ‘quick fix’, and successfully making the transition towards a more sustainable and equitable energy system requires a long-term commitment from all stakeholders.

He highlights Defy’s WE-InTech programme as one such example; offering training, internships and job opportunities to women pursuing careers in the STEM fields.

The initiative is centred around increasing participation in new-generation research and development (R&D), posited to offer a sustainable solution that will contribute to building a more inclusive economy.

In alignment with this plan of action, State-owned utility Eskom also recently announced its decision to invest in upskilling staff to become renewable energy artisans.

Through partnering with the South African Renewable Energy Technology Centre (Saretec) in a memorandum of agreement signed last month, Eskom showcased its intention to upskill technicians and qualifying community members in renewable energy.

Soylu says that this too demonstrates support for the JET strategy, facilitating a shift from Eskom’s current dependency on coal while prioritising labour and job creation.

He expresses his endorsement of this decision by Eskom, claiming that it will “develop a trained and capable workforce that can make strides in building a strong and sustainable local renewable energy sector, providing viable solutions to the ongoing energy crisis”.

Soylu adds that this investment will assist the country in meeting global and local environmental objectives.

“We must ensure that all solutions to the energy crisis are socially responsible as well as sustainable, in that they benefit the individual and community, as well as the broader environment,” Soylu states. 

Engineering News

LOADSHEDDING affects a number of sectors, including the education sector. With matric examinations coming up, there are fears that learners will be negatively impacted.

South African Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) spokesperson, Nomusa Cembi, said the move towards a digital era in schools will be derailed and those that have begun to embrace it, using electronic smart boards, have been disrupted.

However, the power utility, Eskom, has since apologised for the continued and unfortunate loadshedding.

The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) has called on Eskom and local government partners to assist in making sure that loadshedding does not prevent learners from achieving their best possible results in these exams.

In a statement, WCED Minister David Maynier said: We will do everything within our power to make sure that the integrity of the matric exams in the province is not compromised.

The department has also shared that it does have  contingency measures that will be put in place for every aspect of the examination process to continue, from the printing of papers to the marking of scripts.

Some education experts believe that the results that the learners will achieve in this exam, build on what they will do with their lives after matric.

Careersportal

Phiwokuhle Mothemela

WHEN the first lockdown came into effect two years ago we all were taken aback. We had to re-evaluate and adjust our lives accordingly.

Apart from people who are still reeling from the effect the pandemic has had on us I think children and school sports have suffered the most.

School sports gradually started coming back into the picture a year ago at a stop-start pace, and those who have worked hard behind the scenes to bring this about have reaped the benefits this year.

I think all school sport coaches will agree with me when I say they had their work cut out for them this past season. Apart from having the big task of reintroducing school sports to children, a far bigger task was dealing with players’ lack of commitment.

I often wondered how I could possibly balance empathy, ensuring progress within a team and where I must draw the line.

Many of our children call it quits after the slightest inconvenience.

On a weekly basis I’d receive last-minute excuses for why they cannot attend practise, and as a coach I would make a judgment call on whether to excuse them or not. But I often did, careful as I was not to project my own passion for sports onto children.

Yes, the pandemic played a very big part, but I do believe parents also need to teach their children the importance of commitment. These are, after all, mutually inclusive.

When looking at how schools across the board are performing, as a coach one cannot help but do some introspection. One often finds oneself wondering if one is actually doing the correct thing and if the children or team is benefiting from one’s work.

Lack of commitment affects the consistency of the team, which is something learners and players need to understand. Being in team sports and not doing one’s best does not only reflect on one as an individual but the whole team, because it breaks the rhythm and camaraderie.

That said, very well done to the coaches and teams who were able to work towards and achieve the goals they set for themselves this season, having the dedication of the whole team.

To us who battled, try again next season.

Something I take away from this season is that although most times people attribute the success of a team to the coach, how well able they are to impart their skills and knowledge to a team, a huge chunk of the work lies with the players, because as a coach one provides only guidelines, but the players execute it.

Accountability and commitment are truly where school sports’ success lies, and the sooner everyone understands this and actively works towards putting these into practice the better.

Worcester Standard

WENDY MOTHATA

PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa has expressed his deep sadness at the death of 19 learners and two adults in a collision between a bakkie and a truck near Pongola in northern KwaZulu-Natal on Friday.

The learners were allegedly transported on a bakkie when their vehicle collided with a truck.

“This is yet another sad moment for our country, following the substantial loss of young lives in an Eastern Cape tavern recently,” said Ramaphosa.

“We cannot afford to lose such precious lives under any conditions. I hope the investigation into the Pongola incident will shed light on the cause of this tragedy and help us take better care of our children into the future.”

KZN Premier Nomusa Dube-Ncube has meanwhile called on the courts to deliver justice to the victims of the horror crash.

Dube-Ncube described the incident as “painfully sad.”

“This is one of the most tragic accidents in our province in recent times. What is painfully sad is to learn that this accident has taken the lives of so many of our young people whose future and that of their families is now destroyed,” said Dube-Ncube.

“Sadly, it is becoming clearer by the day that increasingly, human factors are playing a major role in road fatalities in our province which is cause for major concern. We commend the SAPS and the community for working together to facilitate the arrest of the driver of the truck that was involved in this fatal accident who had also fled the scene. We therefore call on the Justice, Crime Prevention and Security Cluster to act swiftly and in concert to ensure that justice is delivered for the sake of the victims and
their families.”

Dube-Ncube said that the provincial government will provide all the necessary support to the surviving families to ensure that they are able to bear the impact of the tragedy.

“We also convey our sincere condolences to the families, relatives and friends who have lost their loved ones in this terrible accident. The provincial government will provide all the necessary support to the surviving families to ensure that they are able to bear the impact of this tragedy and when the time comes, to lay the souls of the departed to rest with the appropriate dignity. May their souls rest in peace,” said Dube-Ncube.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) said it was clear that the ANC-led government was failing KZN’s road users.

“The lawlessness and carnage that we are witnessing is proof of this. Yesterday also saw a separate incident involving learners. The only positive is that there were no deaths in this particular instance,” said Francois Rodgers, DA leader in the KZN Legislature.

“Given the growing crisis in our province, the DA expects National Transport Minister, Fikile Mbalula, to intervene and ensure that our roads are safe, properly maintained and that there is increased visible policing.”

Rodgers said the DA will be closely monitoring the outcome of the Pongola crash investigation.

“Both the Minister and his MEC and must be held accountable while the perpetrator must be behind bars sooner rather than later. Justice must be served on behalf of the families,” he said.

INSIDE EDUCATION

AT the start of April 2022, the Department of Social Development handed over the responsibility of early childhood development to the Department of Basic Education, paving the way for earlier schooling in South Africa.

Two years of early childhood development (ECD) is set to become compulsory for all children before they enter the formal school system in grade 1.

Since taking over ECD from the social development department, the Department of Basic Education said that it has identified “a multitude of challenges” in the early childhood development sector – systemic challenges, access challenges, and challenges in the quality of learning.

The main systemic challenges entail the historic underfunding of the sector, it said, including a lack of infrastructure support to ECD centres, an overly burdensome regulatory framework, the lack of a management information system, the lack of a quality assurance system and under-qualified practitioners.

“The challenge with access is that only 58% of 3-year-olds and 75% of 4-year-olds are currently accessing early learning opportunities. Ideally, we would like all 4-year-olds to be able to access early learning opportunities,” the department said.

The department said it is prioritising the systemic challenges by creating an enabling environment, adding that work is ongoing in addressing the regulatory challenges through the Second Children’s Amendment Bill and the review of the Norms and Standards for ECD registration.

Responding in a written parliamentary Q&A this week, basic education minister Angie Motshekga said that the department is also addressing access issues by provisioning grade R infrastructure for schools.

This is already being funded through the Education Infrastructure Grant and the Equitable share portion by provinces, she said.

She said the department is working to ensure that there are enough grade R classrooms to accommodate the shift, with these classrooms being procured through four main routes:

New standalone grade R classrooms;New or replacement schools provided with grade R classrooms;Ordinary classrooms converted into grade R; andMobile classrooms used as grade R classrooms.

Explaining the importance of the shift of compulsory grade R to parliament, the department noted that more South African children are expected to begin reading earlier, with higher standards of reading expected to be introduced in the earlier primary school grades.

The move is also expected to provide better monitoring systems, including systems to gauge the school readiness of children when they enter grade 1.

The department said that it also plans to provide further support to Foundation Phase (Grade R – Grade 3) teachers, including Individualised coaching and Early Grade Reading Assessment (EGRA) tools. It has also pledged to strengthen school-level Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) to advance teacher capacity.

The compulsory schooling change is included in the draft Basic Education Laws Amendment (BELA) bill. The bill is currently sitting in National Assembly. Public comment for the bill closed on 15 August 2022.

In addition to the compulsory grade R, the bill makes a raft of proposals, including:

Compulsory attendance: Stricter punishments will be introduced for parents who fail to ensure their children attend school, including jail time and/or a fine of up to 12 months.Absenteeism: The bill states that teachers, principals and school governing bodies must take responsibility and accountability for learners that are within their school community by ascertaining the whereabouts of a learner who is absent from school for a period of more than three days without a valid reason.Corporal punishment: Corporal punishment is abolished and no person may inflict or impose corporal punishment to a learner at a school, during a school activity, or in a hostel accommodating learners of a school.Initiation practices: The bill prohibits initiation practices in a hostel accommodating learners, and during a school activity.Governing body disclosures: Members of a school governing body, like other public officials, will be required tp disclose on an annual basis their financial interests and the financial interests of their spouse, partner and immediate family members.Homeschooling: The bill introduces further clarity around home-schooling, including that South African learners may be educated at home only if they are registered for such education.Business with the state: The bill will prohibit educators from conducting business with the state or from being a director of a public or private company conducting business with the state, and creates an offence should an educator contravene the abovementioned provision.

SOURCE: BUSINESS TECH

THE latest PwC Vice-Chancellor Survey for 2022 showed that universities are rapidly transforming to become more digitally aligned – making a big shift to virtual schooling- but access remains the biggest hurdle.

The survey questioned vice-chancellors and deputy vice-chancellors from 26 of South Africa’s universities. PwC also conducted benchmarking analysis across public universities based on their 2021 audited annual financial statements.

PwC found that during the pandemic, many universities were forced to accelerate their digital learning deployments faster than expected.

Despite this, due to the rate of acceleration to digital platforms, many learners had challenges with accessibility, inclusion and engagement, said PwC.

“We were reminded that the digital equity gap in Africa unfortunately persists. Moreover, the initial reaction to virtual learning has left students divided on whether they prefer physical classes to online learning.”

According to another PwC report, the Voice of the Student Survey, almost half of all students (49%) prefer virtual learning, 38% prefer hybrid learning formats, and 13% prefer in-person classes.

Only 13% of students indicated a preference for in-person classes, with most preferring either a hybrid or online medium for teaching and learning.

South Africa is not alone in this phenomenon, higher education institutions across the globe have been forced – over the past two years – to take a closer look at many different aspects of their operations, including how technology is disrupting their traditional business models.

According to a Global Market Insights report, the number of students taking online courses has expanded rapidly, with the e-learning market capping $250 billion in revenue in 2020.

By 2027, this is expected to surge to a compound annual growth rate of 21%, said PwC. Vice-chancellors, in response to the group’s survey, added that the higher education industry is significantly behind the corporate world when it comes to digitalisation.

Many respondents believed that in-person learning should be the preferred method – university stakeholders remain positive about the shift towards virtual classrooms as complementary.

PwC expects even more students to prefer virtual learning, especially when virtual learning experiences improve, advances in digitisation are made, and access to technology becomes more affordable.

STAFF REPORTER

JOHN FISCHETTI

YEAR 12 students around Australia are preparing to sit their final exams. For many young people this is one of the most stressful parts of school, with their future supposedly coming down to one number.

This is an outdated way of finishing school and working out what students do in the next phase of their lives.

Universities and TAFEs are increasingly using other methods – such as interviews or portfolios – to offer places to school leavers. In 2021, more than 25,000 NSW students applied for an early offer through the “schools recommendation scheme”, to lock in a university place before they sit their exams. This is up from 5,447 in 2014, suggesting year 12 exams may not be as necessary as we once thought.

Our research shows you can reliably predict a student’s year 12 results by year 11. This also suggests we don’t need a battery of stressful exams to work out if a student is suited for tertiary education.

This gives us the opportunity to radically rethink how the final years of school are structured.

Our research

Two years ago, we studied more than 10,000 students in the Catholic Education Diocese of Paramatta, NSW. We have repeated the study and our work now includes 20,000 students across 21 exam areas.

We used predictive analytics which links multiple pieces of information about student progression through school.

We used 17 variables including year 9 NAPLAN scores, Higher School Certificate subject choices and year 11 attendance. We also use demographic information, such as how long a student has lived in Australia and a school’s socioeconomic rating.

Across both our studies, we found we could predict year 12 results in year 11, with a 93% accuracy rate.

Our purpose here is not to label students, but to change the focus of school and the efforts of students and teachers.

What can we do differently in schools?

We are already seeing the beginnings of new ways of “doing school” in Australia. Some schools are changing their focus from year 12 exams to students doing internships, creating portfolios of work, doing TAFE or university certificates, or doing an overseas exchange.

In British Columbia, Canada, final school assessments include a project that connects “real-world” applications of the curriculum for each student.

In Estonia, now among the world leaders in education, traditional “knowledge and understanding” approaches have been replaced with a strong emphasis on critical thinking, problem-solving, entrepreneurship, digital skills and citizenship. These are all qualities that fit with both employers’ needs and measures of success in the adult world.

Students undertake a cross-disciplinary creative project to graduate from the equivalent of year 10 – an example might be studying the impact of music on managing the onset of dementia in older people. They then do a research project before finishing high school.

Year 12 exams are outdated

High school as we’ve known it has been dominated by high stakes, high-pressure exams that have outlived their usefulness. If we can reliably predict the results, we don’t need the tests.

We know young people’s mental health is already poor, and has suffered further during COVID.

We should be looking for ways to improve, rather than exacerbate this. We also know universities are increasingly open to other ways of admitting students.

There is an enormous opportunity here to reallocate resources and create a modern, meaningful school experience that excites young people. It can encourage them to seek career-building activities, study overseas, learn languages or follow passion projects – not just study for stressful exams that tell us what we already know.

The research for this piece is a continuation of the work initiated by Dr Raju Veranasi for his 2021 Phd at the University of Newcastle.

THE CONVERSATION

IN a collaborative partnership with teacher unions, non-profit organisation (NPO) Tangible Africa has trained over 600 teachers across South Africa in coding skills to implement in the classroom.

The teachers, who were trained between June and September, are now known as Master Trainers, and in turn, will train around 16 000 other teachers in offline coding, the NPO says.

Leva Foundation operations manager Jackson Tshabalala says 500 South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU), 40 National Teachers’ Union (NATU) and 60 Suid-Afrikaanse Onderwysersunie (SAOU) teachers were trained across all nine provinces in less than three months.

The training comes as government is looking to rollout a coding and robotics curriculum in South African schools.

The Department of Basic Education (DBE) believes a coding and robotics curriculum will develop learners’ ability to solve problems, think critically, work collaboratively and creatively, function in a digital and information-driven world, apply digital and ICT skills, and transfer these skills to solve everyday problems.

According to the DBE’s annual performance plan for 2022/2023, the full-scale implementation for Grade R to Grade 3, and Grade 7 is planned for the academic year 2023.

For other grades from 4 to 9, the subjects of robotics and coding will be on the pilot from 2022 to 2023, and full-scale implementation in these grades will be seen between 2024 and 2025.

Achievable coding

“This was a great collaboration between Tangible Africa and the teachers unions. The most rewarding part of the training was demystifying coding to some of the teachers who reported feelings of anxiety, fear and nervousness before the training, but afterwards felt encouraged, ready and excited to start coding at their schools,” says Tshabalala.

The training offered by 12 young facilitators from Tangible Africa, an engagement project of Nelson Mandela University Computing Sciences Department and the Leva Foundation, empowered the teachers to teach coding concepts without computers – by using limited resources, including a smartphone and coding app games (downloadable as TANKS, RANGERS and BOATS).

“This was also an empowering experience for our facilitators, who are mostly graduates from the university. They were able to share their technical skillset in a workshop setting, and for some of our facilitators it was their first time on a plane. The training allowed our facilitators to build up their capacity to offer future Unplugged Coding workshops to other organisations,” says Tshabalala.

SADTU vice-president of education Faseega Solomon says the project by Tangible Africa suited the Teacher Union Collaboration training earmarked for the year since it was themed “skills for a changing world”.

The annual training is a partnership between the major unions in the country and the DBE.

“What stood out from all the other service providers was that these coding concepts could be taught in schools without the necessary infrastructure and gadgets. Teachers will be able to develop skills needed for the 21st century, like problem-solving and collaboration, to empower learners irrespective of the resources they have available at their schools,” says Solomon.

She commends the Tangible Africa facilitators for being well-trained and presenting the training in a fun and interactive manner.

Tangible Africa says many of the Master Trainer teachers are now already implementing the training in their classrooms and receiving requests from other schools for further training. Solomon believes the training will not stop at the earmarked 16 000 teachers, but will reach even more schools to have a multiplying impact.

NATU director Prof Sitwala Imenda says by using the Master Trainer teachers to capacitate other teachers, it also removes the fear they have about these concepts: “When they see their colleagues handling the coding and robotics content, they are motivated. Furthermore, by using this cascading approach, instead of using private entities, we also achieve economies of both scale and skill.”

He continues to say the skills taught will assist learners and teachers not only in the technological world in which we live today, but also in the future. “By exposing educators of NATU to these concepts and principles, we seek to create a critical mass of teacher champions to imbue learners with skills for the future,” says Imenda.

Koos van der Walt, who co-ordinated the training of 60 SAOU teachers in the central region, agrees the coding concepts could be taught in both high resource and low resource schools.

“I haven’t seen teachers enjoy themselves this much during training in a long a time. They were eager to take the concepts back to the classroom and were extremely positive about the training,” says Van der Walt.

Thinking it through

Teachers who received the training were oriented to coding and robotics as a subject and encouraged to understand the thinking processes required from learners.

“Some of these things we are already doing in the classroom, like problem-solving, logic and movement. The training helps to demystify what coding is, and how easy it is to implement in the classroom,” says Hudson Park Primary technology integrator and ICT teacher Kelly Bush.

Bush, from East London, has developed lesson plans based on the TANKS and BOATS apps that formed part of the training.

Tangible Africa notes this work has earned her a provincial nomination for the National Teachers Awards, taking place later this month.

“The lesson plans link with concepts learners are familiar with in the South African environment. Items we use in the lessons are readily available, like egg boxes, chairs or shoes, so that even under-resourced schools can follow the lessons,” says Bush.

Another teacher, Mary Ann Chetty from Astra Primary School in Chatsworth, who participated in the SADTU Master Training, says she was already introducing coding concepts into her classroom and planning to offer extra-curricular games to children at her school in Kwa-Zulu Natal.

“I have a much better understanding of what we can do at our school with coding and robotics. The fact that the games are unplugged helps so much for a school like ours,” says Chetty.

SOURCE| ITWEB

KELLY E. MATTHEWS, JASON M. LODGE and MELISSA JOHNSTONE

EACH year tens of thousands of higher education students complete the Student Experience Survey. It’s seen as a litmus test of student engagement, satisfaction and educational quality. But do the ways in which institutions and governments try to understand student experiences still add up?

The pandemic has transformed enrolment patterns and the ways in which students interact with their institutions and the courses they offer. We suggest the data from the 2021 survey released today no longer adequately capture students’ experience of study. The current version of the survey was designed for a time when modes of study were more clearly defined than they have become since COVID-19 emerged.

The student survey is part of the Australian Quality Indicators of Learning and Teaching (QILT) suite of measures for higher education. The 2021 report shows ratings are more positive compared to 2020 for younger and internal (classroom-based) students. According to the report, this “can likely be attributed to some return to on-campus learning and also a change in the expectations and experience of students”.

But how are “internal” students engaging in their studies? Does learning look the same today compared to 2019, and should it?

New forms of flexibility in student mode of study have to be matched with new forms of support to enable students to make smart choices. The mode of study categorised as internal for the survey now includes so much variation that it no longer serves a useful function for reporting and analysis purposes.

Why QILT results matter

Individual higher education providers might use results to:

set key performance indicators – for example, “by 2030, we will be in the top 3 universities for learner engagement”market themselves – “we are the top Australian university for teaching quality”undertake evidence-informed planning – “develop sense-of-belonging roadmap to increase scores”.

Student survey data are also used in research that informs policymakers. Drawing on many years of survey results, social scientists analyse datasets to answer big, high-level questions.

It’s more than a matter of comparing universities and providers. Questions of equity and access are investigated. For example, how are rural and regional students engaging in higher education?

These data are used in research with other national datasets. For example, reports from the National Centre for Student Equity in Higher Education at Curtin University demonstrate the importance of such data.

COVID has changed how we study

The pandemic shone a light on issues of student equity as mode of study shifted (as a recent review showed). Mode of attendance is defined as:

internal: classroom-basedexternal: online, correspondence, and electronic-based (the language used for data-collection purposes shows how outdated it is)multimodal: mix of internal and external.

In 2019, about 75% of Australian higher education students were enrolled as internal students. Multimodal studies accounted for roughly 14%.

Even at that time, it could have been argued that the lines between internal (classroom-based) and external (online) were already becoming blurred. Lecture recordings, learning management systems, flipped classrooms, endless debates about the “lecture”, and growth in digital technologies not only broadened access to knowledge but also enabled a mix of online and in-class interaction.

The use of existing technologies was a key reason the higher education sector could pivot online in a week when the pandemic hit in early 2020. Imagine if the pandemic had happened in 2005 instead of 2020? Higher education institutions would have simply shut down without these technologies.

Now we have had two years’ experience of online learning and new modes of study. Examples include attendance via Zoom rooms, live online, hi-flex (making class meetings and materials available so students can access them online or in person), swapping from on-campus to online due to lockdowns, students moving between internal and external study on a week-by-week basis. Does the either-or categorisation of modes of attendance – internal or external – still make sense?

5 problems with categorising attendance this way

We have identified at least five problems with the current survey categorisation of modes of attendance:

1. categorising attendance as purely one or other mode, rather than a combination of modes, stifles research and analysis of important national datasets

2. the existing categorisations stifle innovation, limiting institutions from creating distinctive blends of modes of teaching and learning

3. it perpetuates an outdated, either/or mindset that permeates discussion in the sector

4. it masks important implications of differences between new and established modes of attendance, including:

hidden workloads for staff, leading to questions of burnout and mental healthunclear expectations for students, which hinders decision-making and effective study approacheshidden costs and unclear planning processes for differing modes of studylack of clarity about blurred modes of study being offered, which can restrict access to higher education and create obstacles to success for equity students.

5. the sector is missing opportunities to gather relevant mass-scale data on modes of attendance to guide policy and practice.

Sector needs to agree on a new model

The crude categorisation of modes of study is hindering evidence-based decision-making. Across the sector, institutions are scrambling to sort out how best to maintain the flexibility many students now demand while ensuring students meet expected learning outcomes. And institutions need to do so in ways that are sustainable and healthy for staff.

As the chaos of the pandemic hopefully subsides, the higher education sector would benefit from a sector-wide process of developing an agreed way of describing the full range of modes of attendance. A framework is needed that enables shared understanding of all these modes. This will enable institutions to better plan, resource, innovate and engage students and staff.

Such a framework could then inform ongoing national data collection, such as QILT, so social scientists and educational researchers can, in turn, better guide policy and practice.

THE CONVERSATION