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THE Democratic Alliance (DA) says it hat the real matric pass rate is 54.6% and not the 80.1% Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga has announced on Thursday last week.
The party said it calculated the real matric pass rate by bringing into account the number of learners that dropped out and never made it to matric.
The dropout rate for the 2022 matric class, according to the DA, is 31.8 % (337 364 learners).
“The real 2022 matric pass rate is only 54.6%, an increase from 2021’s 50.4%. This is very concerning,” Baxolile Nodada, DA’s shadow Minister of Basic Education said.
“And while the DA disputes the Department of Basic Education’s (DBE) pass rate of 80.1%, we are very proud of each and every matric that successfully graduated. We also urge those that did not do well to not give up, the current outcome does not determine their destiny.”
Nodada said some learners opt out of schooling at the end of Grade 9 to pursue their education through technical and vocational education and training (TVET), but a large number simply stop their education entirely.
To bring the TVET learners into account the DA calculates the real matric pass rate from the Grade 10 cohort that ought to complete matric.
The Northern Cape had the highest dropout rate of 41.6%, followed by Free State with 40.6%, while the Western Cape had the lowest dropout rate of 27.6%.
The province with the highest pass rate was the Free State.
The Western Cape was the leader in distinctions with 6.2%.
“What makes the national 45.4% fail rate and high dropout rate particularly concerning is that many of those learners contribute to the country’s staggering youth unemployment of 59.6% (6 in every 10 young South African is unemployed) – a little over 3.5 million youth are not in education, employment or any form of skills training,” he said.
“Given the fact that the Minister of Basic Education, Angie Motshekga, recently revealed in an answer to a parliamentary question from the DA that her Department has not established a system of tracking learners that exit the public schooling system and does not have information regarding learners’ further education or employment paths in line with outcome 3 and 4 of the Medium-Term Strategic Framework of DBE, means a high likelihood of learners joining the unemployment lines once they leave school, whether through dropping out or after graduation.”
The party said unless DBE addresses the twin issues of the high dropout rate and the ineffective curriculum offering that fails to fully develop knowledge and skills to access economic opportunities, the majority of matriculants’ future will be very limited.
“Not only does the curriculum have to be tailored with a determined focus on cultivating entrepreneurship and creativity to best cultivate citizens that will be able to create economic opportunities and prosperity, the failure to establish a strong literacy and numeracy base in the foundation phases sets learners up for failure and increases the likelihood of them dropping out at a later stage or achieve poor quality outcomes to access further education as we have seen in Matric results,” he said.
Nodada said South Africa desperately needs more teachers that specialise in the STEM subjects – science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
“The DA will continue to highlight the crucial need for continuous professional development of teachers in line with an effective curriculum offering that will develop learners’ knowledge and skills, and we once again urge the Minister to seriously consider our suggestion of an independent school monitoring evaluation authority to evaluate and monitor teachers,” he said.
INSIDE EDUCATION