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Lerato Mbhiza
The Gauteng Department of Education (GDE) is ready to start with the National Senior Certificate examinations from 30 October to 5 December, with CAT and IT rewrites taking place on 6 December.
This was confirmed by Gauteng Education MEC Matome Chiloane, who highlighted some of the initiatives the department has taken to ensure learners’ preparedness for the exams.
Chiloane was speaking at a ceremony at Ponelopele Oracle Secondary School in Johannesburg on Monday, where he outlined the province’s readiness for the exams and also gave an update on the status of the 2024 online admission for Grades 1 and 8.
“We have done a lot to ensure that we support our matriculants this year,” Chiloane said. “We continued with our Secondary School Improvement Programmes, mainly targeting schools that are struggling, Section 68B [the non-exclusion of learners from schools], as well as our township schools.”
Chiloane warned NSC candidates to not be disruptive during exams because those found breaking the rules will be removed immediately from the examination centres and banned from continuing with the exams.
GDE spokesperson Steve Mabona said the focus for this year’s exams is on credibility, integrity, efficiency and ensuring there are no technical irregularities.
He reiterated Chiloane’s warning that candidates found cheating will be barred from writing future examinations.
Mabona said 191,181 candidates have registered to write the examinations. Of these, 132 561 are full-time candidates and 58,620 are part-time repeat candidates.
There are a total of 1,015 examination centres, which include 738 public centres, 277 independent centres, and 93 centres for part-time/repeater candidates. A total of 16 new centres have been activated and registered with the department.
Mabona said candidates were helped by participating in the Secondary School Improvement Programme (SSIP) from September to October this year. Candidates were taken to SSIP residential camps for 12 weeks, where they were extensively coached on different subjects.
During training, special attention was paid to checking learners’ IDs to eliminate imposters.
Students will not be allowed to take cell phones into the exam centres, and the GDE has said that wristwatches will also not be allowed to eliminate all possible means by which learners could access and/or share information digitally and online while writing their examinations.
High-level security mechanisms remain in place and have been augmented to mitigate any leaks of question papers, including strict adherence to norm times when collecting and returning examination material before and after every exam.
The department has appointed service providers to augment security for the duration of the examinations, including armed escorts, response units, and CCTV cameras.
Regarding possible load-shedding, Mabona said exam centres that did not have generators would procure or rent generators to avoid any disruptions that may result from power cuts.
“The Department has also leased generators to ensure that backup power is available during load-shedding to allow for key processes such as marking and capturing to proceed,” Mabona said.
INSIDE EDUCATION