JONATHAN JANSEN | System is ‘stabilising’, yet other numbers tell a different story — who’s lying?
In the aftermath of the basic education minister’s announcement, I’ve had to deal with the fallout of this mass deception in the grade 12 results
Which 80% do you choose to believe is the better indicator of the health of the South African school system: the one the minister of basic education announced last week, that 82.9% of our children passed (https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2024-01-18-class-of-2023-records-an-improved-829-matric-pass-rate/) the National Senior Certificate (NSC) examination, or the international benchmark study of 2021 that showed 81% of grade 4 learners cannot read for meaning (https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/opinion-and-analysis/opinion/2023-05-28-dont-read-too-much-into-sas-child-literacy-stats/) in any language (worse, in fact than the 78% score of 2016)? Both cannot be true...
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