Radical matric reform on the cards

Tougher requirements for a basic matric, raising university entrance standards and dumping life orientation are among radical new proposals put forward to save South Africa 's education system.

The Sunday Times can today disclose that the recommendations of a ministerial task team on the National Senior Certificate propose sweeping changes to the way matrics are taught and tested.

Another big change is the re-introduction of mathematics at the growing number of schools that have abandoned the subject.

The proposals are likely to be welcomed by education experts, who say the poor quality of the matric certificate and the generally low level of education offered at South Africa's public schools are handicapping South Africa's young people and not properly preparing them for the world of work.

The acid test for Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga could come when the proposals are put to education union Sadtu, which has been a stumbling block to education reform in the past.

The results of the national senior certificate task team have yet to be made public.

The report - drawn up by eminent education academics - has been given to Motshekga, but has not been openly discussed with trade unions, MECs for education or the cabinet.

Introducing a tougher matric pass rate as well as raising the criteria for a university pass are likely to be widely welcomed, but may prove controversial to a generation of ANC politicians who have been able to boast of a growing matric pass rate.

The much maligned 30% pass rate has come under increasing fire from experts such as the University of the Free State's Professor Jonathan Jansen, who this year described it as an "absolute disgrace".

"I'm ashamed of South Africa. It's an absolute disgrace that you can pass matric with a mark of 30%. Motshekga is making a giant mistake by boasting about the matric pass rate. It's an absolute disgrace."

The committee suggested that requirements for matrics who wanted to study for a degree be changed to passing four subjects - including the language of instruction - at 50%, and two others at 40%.

Life orientation - a post-apartheid subject introduced to teach pupils about health, careers and citizenship - should be abolished as an exam subject for Grade 12, the report said.

The task team said it believed that the subject - the only one that did not have an external exam set - artificially allowed low-performing pupils to pass matric.

It recommended that parts of the subject such as career counselling and wellbeing be retained without exams.

The document also suggested widespread changes to matric maths and maths literacy and the task team insisted that mathematics be offered at all schools across South Africa.

The committee expressed concern at the increasing number of schools that did not offer maths at all. In 2008, 150 schools did not offer maths; by 2012 this had grown to 286.

The task team also recommended that matrics should not be allowed to take up certain science subjects or a combination of economics and accounting at matric level without doing maths as well.

Some of the issues aimed at teachers include:

The ways in which schools award marks during the year must be monitored so that standards can be universally maintained;

Principals and heads of subjects in schools must be held more accountable for the validity and reliability of schools-based assessment during the matric year because internal standards in schools vary too much at present;

Teachers who moderate the final matric exam must be appointed using stricter criteria than are employed at present;

Teachers marking the final matric exam at all levels of seniority must have the required qualifications and experience;

Teachers marking the final matric exam must be required to demonstrate their competence prior to being appointed;

Non-education-related criteria, such as tribalism or political sectionalism, must be eradicated from the system of appointing teachers marking final matric exams;

Teachers marking final matric exams who are found to have provided false information about their experience and qualifications must be prosecuted; and

Teachers marking final matric exams who fail to meet the required standards for marking papers must be barred from continuing to mark, and if they have marked some papers, those be re-marked in full.

The committee also recommended that newspapers no longer be able to publish matric results, but rather focus on "individual success stories" of matrics.

"The extreme embarrassment of candidates who are not successful and are so publicly revealed as failures has serious consequences, and there are cases annually of its leading to self-harm and even suicide," the report states.

Other recommendations include:

The standard of the exams in the language of instruction must be raised and the papers made tougher;

A national Grade 9 exit certificate qualification should be introduced;

Matric exams for English additional language must be made harder because of the language competence demands across the curriculum and for post-school study;

Specifically improving the skills of teachers teaching English additional language;

Modernising vocational training, including the curriculum for technical high schools;

Benchmark reports that clearly highlight serious flaws in the papers be shared more widely; and

A thorough investigation into the standard and the nature of the assessment of African languages at home-language level must be undertaken.

In reaction, Motshekga's spokes-man, Elijah Mhlanga, pointed out that the report had not yet been released. He confirmed that Motshekga had received the report.

"The minister is currently studying the report and she will make an announcement shortly on the recommendations that will be taken forward.

"This should be done soon after presenting the report to the Council for Education Ministers," Mhlanga said.

New, tougher matric maths fears

A new curriculum could push down this year's matric maths results.

This was a fear of the ministerial team investigating matric exams, which has recommended sticking to the old system for another eight to 10 years in the interests of stability.

The new-look matric maths will be written for the first time this year.

The team said its main concern was the shortage of "competent and qualified teachers to teach a new, more demanding mathematics curriculum".

It criticised the number of curriculum changes made since 1994.

"A clear and recurrent theme discernible through the submissions to the task team is a plea for curriculum stability and concern at the negative effect that serial curriculum change has had on mathematics teaching and learning," the team said.

"From 1994, each new minister of education has introduced curriculum policy reviews and reforms, ranging from early syllabus revisions to address the legacy of apartheid, to curriculum 2005, with outcomes-based education, followed by national curriculum statements in a new national senior certificate, and now the curriculum and assessment policy statement.

"Of particular relevance to South Africa is the observation that continuous changes impact the fragile, under-resourced parts of the education system most, and are more likely to contribute to their dysfunctionality than to their improvement.".

African languages flagged

A red flag has been raised about the standard of matric exams in African languages, which seem much easier than exams for English and Afrikaans.

The ministerial matric exam task team said the standard of the African languages home language papers had repeatedly given rise to questions over the past five years. The issue had been controversial, not only in public, but also in interactions between examination authorities and the Department of Basic Education.

"One key issue that has arisen as a criticism of the NSC is that the mean scores are very high in the African languages compared with Afrikaans and English and all other subjects in the matric exam.

"On the raw scores, learners writing Xitsonga and Tshivenda papers attained an average of more than 70% in 2013, which is disproportionate to their performance in other subjects.

"Furthermore, whilst the mean scores for African languages are all above 60%, the mean scores for Afrikaans and English are below 60%.

"Only in the case of candidates writing Afrikaans home language or English home language was passing the home language examination a good predictor of whether or not they were likely to pass the matric exam overall.

"For instance, in Afrikaans, of the learners that achieved less than 39% for Afrikaans home language, 80% failed the total exam. Of those who achieved 60%-69% only 1.3% failed; at 70%-79% only 0.3% failed and 80%-100%, only 0.1% failed the total exam.

"Despite some slight differences, the overall pattern for the English home-language group was very similar.

"This was not found to be the case for all the African languages. In particular in isiZulu about one-fifth (22%) of the learners who obtained 70% and above in isiZulu home language failed the total exam."

It said a similar pattern was found in Ndebele, Sepedi and Xhosa.

The task team said it believed these figures based on a broad body of data must be troubling, and that a thorough investigation into the standard of African languages at home language level was required.

joubertj@sundaytimes.co.za