Why are we so gullible? In the past two weeks the government announced two major policy positions in education which were swallowed whole by our media houses. Maybe it’s a slow news cycle and we’re desperate for headlines that grab the public’s moneyed attention. But I have seldom seen such political nonsense from our ministers reported as fact.
The first was the announcement of a restructuring proposal for higher education. What got the media excited was the claim that fully fledged universities could be downgraded to lower status, such as university colleges, if they did not meet certain standards such as a required level of research output and a prescribed mix of higher qualifications (such as doctorates) in their offerings.
Think about this for a moment. Right now, two so-called universities are prime candidates for downgrading, if not outright closure. One is the University of Zululand, known over the years for selling teacher education qualifications and threatening (once murdering) those who blew the whistle on this institutional scam. The other is the Vaal University of Technology, which has had even more corruption scandals than the entire Free State provincial government.
Now imagine downgrading one of them. For example, if you want to see Zulu nationalism come flying out of the closet, propose lowering the status of the Ngoye campus. We forget our universities are products of apartheid governance — there was one for Zulus and another for Xhosas (one on each side of the Kei) and a dedicated campus for coloureds. You are definitely “out for lunch” if you think that the de-racialisation of our universities in the 1990s meant that these institutions lost their racial or ethnic DNA in the process. I therefore pity the minister who dares to even suggest downgrading that university.
No, it’s not going to happen, so relax. The proposed policy is meant to give a pathway to university status for agricultural colleges, nursing colleges and private higher education entities which for the moment exist in a no-(wo)man’s land as far as recognition status is concerned. In other words, the plan is to upgrade potential universities rather than downgrade existing institutions of higher education.
Behind this silly proposal is the assumption that children’s academic performance will improve if they are taught in the mother-tongue. This too has been refuted by research in the South African context.
Behind the proposals lies a cautious, conservative logic: rather than create new universities from scratch (such as the proposed new university on the East Rand), let them evolve and prove themselves first as university colleges under tutelage of an established university. This, by the way, is nothing new. In the previous century all SA universities started as university colleges under the examining authority of Unisa (which itself was first a college under the University of London) before gaining full status as autonomous institutions.
The other policy announcement not worth a government gazette is that school subjects will be taught in the African languages from grade 4. Unless you’re an outright language bigot, of course this is a wonderful idea. But it's not going to happen because there are too few teachers produced with the expertise to even begin to teach the range of subjects competently through senior primary and high school; we are not graduating them as teachers in any significant numbers.
Behind this silly proposal is the assumption that children’s academic performance will improve if they are taught in their mother tongue. This too has been refuted by research in the SA context. The reason our youth fare so poorly in gateway subjects such as science and mathematics is that they are poorly taught in any language. In other words, the problem is not mother-tongue instruction; teachers lack the content (what to teach) knowledge and the pedagogical (how to teach) knowledge in their respective subjects.
Which raises the question: why does the department of basic education regularly pronounce on big plans for African languages? Quite simple, actually. It’s good politics. It signals attention to a sensitive and embarrassing area of social and political neglect. To say as a minister that you will pay attention to such a treasured cultural asset is to play on the emotional heartstrings of people’s languages. But that’s all it does, appeal to your heart rather than your head.
Show me one cabinet minister whose child or grandchild is in a school where the African languages are taught through high school. Not a single one. Their offspring are at old colonial schools such as Bishops and St Johns, where English reigns supreme. Like it or not, our schools and universities are places where English has become the settled language. It has become the compromise language at universities between Afrikaans, on the one hand, and other African languages on the other hand.
No, I don’t like it, but that is the truth. Government officials should stop lying to the people and the media needs to stop being led by the nose.
