Edwin Naidu

Celebrating the 150th anniversary of the University of South Africa yesterday, Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, Dr Blade Nzimande, on Monday urged the world’s oldest distance learning institution to draw on its inspiring former student heroes to reclaim its greatness.

Founded in 1873, Nzimande said UNISA occupies a unique place in the annals of higher education history as the oldest university in the country, birthing the university system in South Africa.

Stalwarts of the struggle against oppression and Apartheid, ZK Matthews and John Langalibalele Dube were amongst the first Africans to receive degrees from Unisa since Simon-Peter Mihlali, the first black student to matriculate in 1879.

The Minister reminded guests, including former president Thabo Mbeki, Deputy President Paul Mashatile; Ambassadors and High Commissioners representing various Countries in South Africa; several ministers, and academics, that UNISA boasts among its million and more alum community, the likes Youth League President Anton Lembede, Former President Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Emeritus Demond Tutu, Anti-apartheid activists and Rivonia Trialists Ahmed Kathrada and Denis Goldberg, former Chief Justices of South Africa, among others.

“UNISA is also the alma mater of our very own President Cyril Ramaphosa,” he added.

In the 1940s, he said notable figures such as Oliver Tambo, Getrude Nhlabati, Sir Seretse Khama and Robert Mugabe, amongst others, received their degrees from the University of Fort Hare, registered as external Unisa students.

“Those who study with Unisa today should thus be proud that they share an alma mater with such distinguished personalities,” he added.

Nzimande urged Unisa to take advantage of its added leverage of having Mbeki as Chancellor, whom he described as an inspirational leader who has distinguished himself as a philosopher and leading thinker known for his ground-breaking revitalisation of the African Renaissance, the repositioning of Africa and South Africa as prominent international economic and political role players,” he added.

With enrolment projected at 370 000 plus students across 130 countries in the world, Unisa is one the mega-universities in the world today.

Despite the august nature of the occasion, Nzimande expressed concern about the current developments at the institution regarding its strategic direction, quality of administration and academic outcomes, governance and leadership problems which had been facing several administrations and Councils over the past decade.

A report has been tabled to his Ministry, and I shared this with the UNISA Council. This was followed in 2022 by the appointment of an Assessor, Professor Temba Mosiua, to probe specific matters for further investigation. This report has also now been handed to the Ministry, and the next steps will be announced shortly.

Nzimande said he wants UNISA to be restored to its foundational mandate. It must accelerate the modernisation of its technology platforms to fully manage and apply for promising use innovations such as Generative AI (for example, ChatGPT) as tools to assist it in carrying out its operations efficiently across vast geographical distances and, of course regulating its applications in teaching and learning, and research settings.

Celebrating the 150th anniversary of the University of South Africa, Minister of Higher Education, Science, and Innovation, Dr Blade Nzimande, urged the oldest distance-learning institution in the world to fix its problems by drawing on the inspiration from the likes of elder statesmen as Thabo Mbeki in “service of humanity”.

“The revolution in massive online technology providers – many offering free online courses – pose serious challenges to our universities, and UNISA has to compete in this unpredictable, innovation-intensive space successfully,” he said.

“I urge Unisa to take advantage of its added leverage of having as your Chancellor, Former President Thabo Mbeki, an inspirational leader who has distinguished himself as a philosopher and leading thinker, known for his ground-breaking revitalisation of the African Renaissance, the repositioning of Africa and South Africa as prominent international economic and political role players,” he added.

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PHUTI MOSOMANE

Deputy President Paul Mashatile will deliver a keynote address at the 150th anniversary of the University of South Africa on Monday.

The event, which will mark a century and a half of the celebrated University’s existence, will take place at the ZK Mathews Hall in Pretoria.

Mashatile is expected to use the occasion to reflect on how the university has shaped Africa’s intellectual futures over the past 150 years.

As the Chairperson of the Human Resources Development Council, his office said he would congratulate Unisa and its leadership on its continued commitment to providing quality education to students across the African continent and providing much-needed skills for the development of Africa.

The Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, Dr Blade Nzimande, will also be addressing the University of South Africa (Unisa) 150th Anniversary Celebration on Monday under the theme “Reclaiming Africa’s Intellectual Futures”.

Since its establishment on 26 June 1873, Unisa has been at the forefront of the growth and development of South Africa’s higher education system.

Consequently, Unisa has shaped the futures of many people from diverse backgrounds in South Africa, on the African continent and globally.

Not only did Unisa spawn the university system in South Africa, but it was also the first university in the world to adopt open distance education, a modality that has become even more resourceful in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic and the developments in digitisation and the 4IR.

Nzimande said it is thus Unisa’s considered view that as an integral part of the university system, locally and globally, the University will use the occasion of Unisa’s birthday to celebrate this important milestone, to reflect on the past and its challenges, and to carve a strategic path towards an envisaged future Unisa, which will continue to play a central role in knowledge generation and the production of quality graduates.

Former President Thabo Mbeki, Unisa Chancellor, MJ Maboa, Chairperson of the Council and Professor Puleng LenkaBula, Vice-Chancellor and Principal, will be part of the celebrations.

Governance issues

The Unisa council has asked Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande not to disband them but to appoint an additional three members to assist them in performing their duties.

The council pleaded with Nzimande, following an explosive 309-page report by the University of Pretoria academic Themba Mosia, after investigating allegations that the council was ineffective and maladministration claims against principal and vice-chancellor Professor Puleng LenkaBula.

Mosia recommended to Nzimande that the council be disbanded, LenkaBula sacked, and an administrator appointed to run Unisa.

Nzimande is studying the report.

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STAFF REPORTER

Gauteng Education MEC Matome Chiloane has extended the closing date for the 2024 Online Admissions application period for Grade 1 and Grade 8 to 21 July 2023 because the department has noticed that some parents still prefer submitting their applications physically.

The extended deadline will give parents and guardians an opportunity to submit documents after the school recess, which is due to commence from 23 June 2023 until 17 July 2023, said Chiloane. 

The department has also announced that the Online Admissions System has successfully processed over 400 000 applications since the start of the application period a week ago on Thursday, 15 June 2023. 

“As of Thursday, a total of 408 714 applications were processed by the System. This amounts to 176 975 Grade 1 applications and 231 739 Grade 8 applications,” the Department said in a statement. 

Despite this extension, parents and guardians are still encouraged to apply by visiting www.gdeadmissions.gov.za and register to proceed with the application process.

“We have seen it fit to give parents and guardians more time to apply and upload or submit documents at schools. We are also proud of having processed over 400 000 applications within a week, this is a testament to our system’s improvement and the demand of the quality education which Gauteng offers,” said Chiloane.

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STAFF REPORTER

Inadequate funding, inadequate teacher training and limited access to educational resources are among the numerous challenges that Africa needs to grapple with concerning education systems.
It was for these reasons that Professor Chika Sehoole, Chairperson of the Education Deans Forum (EDF), received a resounding YES from his fellow deans when he proposed a platform for deans of schools and faculties of education across the continent to meet and address these obstacles.

This, after sounding the idea of some counterparts from a few African states.

The EDF is one of 11 active communities of practice within Universities in South Africa (USAf). This group fosters research in education towards continuous improvement of teacher education; it promotes South Africa’s education interests by providing an outlet for deans to discuss matters of common concern in the delivery of teacher education, and, finally, the EDF brings to the attention of policymakers, emerging issues on Education as a discipline.

Professor Sehoole, Dean of the Faculty of Education at the University of Pretoria, describes the upcoming platform as one where African education deans will share experiences and best practices, discuss common challenges and collaborate on initiatives towards resolving those issues while supporting one another.

Having agreed on this pan-African forum, the EDF took the lead on the spadework towards establishing the Pan-African Deans of Education Forum(PADEF), whose focus will be in sub-Saharan Africa.

This Forum is founded on the common understanding that education is critical in the development of any society, Africans included. The deans hope to use PADEF to transform teacher education in their respective countries, by, among other activities, sharing best practices and case studies in educational leadership, management, pedagogy and research.

Through PADEF, education deans also hope to advance the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 4 objective of ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all.

PADEF will be launched on 24 July 2023 at Makerere University in Uganda.

The launch has been planned to coincide with Day One of the 2023 Distance Education and Teachers’ Training in Africa (DETA) Conference, scheduled to take place from 24 to 27 July.

An initiative of the University of Pretoria, this conference is aimed, among numerous objectives, at building the capacity of teacher training programmes in Africa. Professor Sehoole, central to the DETA conference planning, says aligning the PADEF launch to the event was a deliberate and strategic move optimising the gathering in one place of all the critical stakeholders.

At the recent EDF meeting on 26 May, the terms of reference of PADEF were endorsed and agreed on for adoption at the launch event, where the collective of African deans will elect a steering committee.

Professor Sehoole explained that although they wish to attract all the education deans in the sub-Saharan Africa region, membership of PADEF is voluntary.

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STAFF REPORTER

Over the past month, there has been a raging debate about reading in schools amid claims that most learners can.

The ongoing public discourse on reading literacy intensified when the results of the latest report on Progress in International Reading and Literacy Study (PIRLS) were released on 16 May.

The report confirmed that South Africa, like virtually all countries, saw lower primary reading competencies declines due to pandemic-related school disruptions. The results show that 81% of South African pupils in Grade 4 cannot read for meaning in any language.

That means that while a child may be able to read the literal text, she cannot interpret the text into context for meaning.

The magnitude of the decline relating to the pandemic does not come as a surprise, said Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga at the weekend in Pretoria.

South Africa was among the countries most actively gauging impacts on learning outcomes during the pandemic.

She said the results shown in PIRLS are in line with earlier findings. All of this is concerning and informs the Government’s emphasis on addressing reading at the foundation phase.

“But it is not true that most learners cannot read and write, as some have put it. In fact, since the release of the report, we have embarked on a series of briefing sessions with various stakeholders to share the findings and provide insight on the mechanics of participating in these international studies,” she said.

The Minister said one of the points sought to make is that South Africa was not competing but merely participating to benchmark against the best in the world.

“It is also important to reiterate that we are one of only three countries in Africa brave enough to participate in PIRLS. We were also the only country to put forward all our official languages in the study.”

Motshekga said early learning is a fundamental stage in a child’s educational journey and that learning did not start in Grade R or Grade 1 but at zero.

“So there are steps the Department can take, but also parents and caregivers have a critical role to play as they are a child’s first and most important teacher during their early years.”

While the Department of Basic Education plays a significant role in supporting early literacy skills and teaching children how to read, the entire ecosystem must be involved.

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STAFF REPORTER

Corruption at tertiary institutions in South Africa came under the spotlight in Parliament last week when the Portfolio Committee on Higher Education, Science and Innovation asked to be briefed on the current going-on in higher education.

In particular, the committee asked for a briefing on the University of Cape Town Council (UCT) investigation report into governance and management challenges, problems at the University of South Africa (UNISA) on governance-related matters, an update on the state of affairs of the University of Fort Hare (UFH) and University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN).

Higher Education, Science and Innovation Minister Blade Nzimande blamed corruption for the ongoing challenges at higher education institutions, saying that universities have become huge sites for personal and private accumulation considering the massive budgets, supply chain and procurement etc.

As corruption increasingly becomes a problem in our society, our institutions of higher learning have not been left untouched,” he said.

The department said it remains concerned about developments in the investigation and continues to monitor the situation.

Out of the country’s 26 public universities, the Minister said 16 independent assessors were appointed since 2000 to probe governance instability.

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EDWIN NAIDU

THE Department of Basic Education is implementing the Presidential Youth Employment Initiative to tackle unemployment among youth in South Africa.

Now in its fourth phase, the Basic Education Employment Initiative (BEEI) seeks to give effect to the objectives of the PYEI, which is South Africa’s most comprehensive response to addressing rampant youth unemployment.

Phase IV will see 255 000 young people appointed in ordinary public schools and schools for learners with special education needs across the country, said Based Education Minister Angie Motshekga in Pretoria at the weekend.

“We also have a responsibility to create employment opportunities, particularly for the youth who are neither in employment, education, nor training,” said Motshekga.

Providing an assessment of Early Childhood Development since the DBE assumed responsibility for its function from Social Development a year ago, Motshekga said much work had been taken forward over the last 12 months, and not all of it is visible outside government.

She said the government was committed to elevating the early years as the foundation of all education and learning and injecting momentum into the government’s commitment to delivering access and quality for every child.

Motshekga said that during the function shift process, the DBE listened carefully to the ECD sector to learn about the challenges faced on the ground and to make sure that its priorities became the government’s focus.

A key priority has been to ensure that government takes standardised approaches to help ECD programmes become registered and access the ECD subsidy. “We have also prioritised training on the National Curriculum Framework and developing a plan for workforce development – which are key planks in our strategy to build quality.”

Referring to government efforts to give youth a hand up, Motshekga said the Second Chance Matric examinations are written mainly to give those young people who seek a second opportunity to improve their marks or rewrite.

These young people recognise that a matric certificate is essential in their lives. More than 279,000 candidates enrolled for the May/June examinations.
The examinations started on 3 May 2023 and concluded this week on June 14. Marking starts this coming week on June 21, and the results will be released on August 7 2023.

The public hearings on the Basic Education Laws Amendment Bill have been concluded. The Portfolio Committee on Basic Education led the public hearings, which began in March this year.

On the Basic Education Laws Amendment Bill (BELA) Bill which seeks to amend certain sections of the South African Schools Act of 1986 to respond to administrative challenges facing schools and continues transforming the education system, Motshekga said it was not a wholesale Bill that covers all aspects of the sector, focusing mainly on the administrative processes of the department and schools.

“It is a Bill that responds to the current needs in terms of the changing demographics of our communities, findings by the courts and our observations as we monitor schools,” she said.

The Bill has 56 clauses ranging from the introduction of Grade R to learner attendance, Code of Conduct for learners, Home Schooling, rationalisation of schools, abolishment of corporal punishment and initiations, language policy, admission policy, and the criminalisation of school disruptions.

“It is concerning to note that some members of the public are debating the content of the Bill along racial and political lines. We urge members of the public to engage more meaningfully and constructively on this matter,” she added.

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