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The Gauteng Education MEC Matome Chiloane says his department has a total of 571 Grade 1 and Grade 8 learners – whose parents and guardians submitted complete applications on the Online Admissions system – remain to be placed. This translates to 97 Grade 1 learners and 474 Grade 8 learners who departmental officials are working towards placing.
On Tuesday, Chiloane reveled that 1 394 have not been placed.
This simply means that the 2023 Online Admissions system has facilitated the placement of over 291 574 Grade 1 and Grade 8 learners (Grade 1: 139 367 and Grade 8: 152 207) to date, spokesperson Steve Mabona said.
Accordingly, the department said, placement challenges within identified high-pressure areas – where certain schools received a much higher number of applications than the number of learners they can accommodate – are being attended to through a variety of interventions which will ensure that all learners are placed.
In order to alleviate capacity pressure, the GDE is building satellite schools in high-pressure areas. These are schools which are an extension of certain high-pressure schools, but are built on a different site or geographical area not far from the main school.
In Johannesburg West, the department says it has already built a satellite school for Florida High School, meaning that we will continue to place learners at that school.
The same applies for Tshwane West, where two satellite schools are currently under construction, Theresapark Primary School No. 2 and Theresapark Secondary School.
In Ekurhuleni, especially in Kempton Park, high-pressure schools will use specialist rooms for teaching, and these have helped significantly to increase capacity.
Olifantsfontein Primary School will be assisted with the delivery of more mobile classrooms to accommodate all unplaced learners at that school.
Parents who seek to apply for inner grades outside of Grade 1 and Grade 8 are encouraged to visit their nearest GDE District Office after our 10 Day Headcount on 24 January 2023.
“This will put our Districts in a better position to give parents the necessary assistance they need for placement as available spaces at schools would have been determined at that stage,” Chiloane said.
In addition, the GDE has commissioned principals at schools to develop catch-up programmes to accommodate learners who were unplaced during the start of the 2023 academic year.
“Our team is working around the clock to ensure that all learners are placed. We appeal with all parents and guardians to allow these processes to take place as they will result in the successful placement of their children. We profusely apologise for the inconvenience caused and we extend our best wishes to all learners and teachers for the 2023 academic year,” said MEC Chiloane.
–INSIDE EDUCATION