The Equal Education (EE) organisation has urged the South African government to urgently abandon rotational timetables and safely reopen schools for all learners. In a statement released just before the 2021 matric results were released, EE said that if the government does not make this happen, we will be confronted with a lost generation of learners.
“The class of 2021, compared to their 2020 peers, has been more negatively affected by the pandemic. The rotational timetabling system was meant to be a temporary intervention to bring learners back into the classroom and simultaneously reduce the risk of learners and teachers contracting and spreading the virus – but it quickly became the ‘new normal’. Sadly, the consequences of learners not attending school every day have been especially damaging for learners from poor and working class families – those who already experienced a poorly functioning education system. All learners must return to the classroom full-time to protect their learning as well as their mental and physical health,” reads the statement by Elizabeth Biney (EE Researcher) and Stacey Jacobs (EE Researcher).
The statement further says the matric class of 2021 lost more than half of teaching time in their Grade 11 year. “This was because schools were closed for long periods and because rotational timetables (where learners only attend school on some days) were implemented when schools reopened. When learners don’t attend school every day, they are more likely to forget some of what they previously learnt, which then makes the possibility of dropping out higher. The impact of these disruptions was in no way equal as learners from disadvantaged backgrounds were particularly affected because their access to printed materials, online learning resources, and other learning interventions was limited. The class of 2021 also suffered when there was a two-week delay to the start of their matric year, following a rise in infections as South Africa battled the second wave of Covid-19.
“For an already fragile education system, Covid-19 made the challenges facing it worse – which put matrics in a very difficult position. The pandemic not only amplified historic inequalities within our schooling system, such as exposing and making worse the impact of education budget cuts, but the closing of schools and the rotational timetable system also deprived learners of essential safety nets such as daily access to school meals (1) and psychosocial support (counselling) at school.”
The basic education minister Angie Motshekga recently announced that all high school learners will attend school every day.
