Matric circus is a cruel farce

THAT annual South African circus, the release of matric results, is about to start.

THAT annual South African circus, the release of matric results, is about to start.

The media speculates about an increase or a decrease in the pass rate, and one or two academics make baseless predictions.

The big day eventually comes.

The education minister, flanked by serious-looking officials, announces the results and irrespective of the outcome, identifies a reason for optimism.

A careless journalist asks whether the results were "manipulated" or "adjusted" to prevent mass failure. On cue, the experts of Umalusi (the quality assurance agency for schools) jump into action and deny such ugly rumours.

Eventually, troops of holiday-dazed teenagers are drag-ged before clicking cameras as smiling premiers dish out mechanical handshakes while privately lamenting that the majority of the top matriculants are still white and privileged.

Yawn.

Lost in this metaphorical circus of trained animals and cart-wheeling clowns is a simple question: is it fair to subject 592000 youths to the same terminal examination when they have had such vastly different school experiences?

John Smart, from a quasi-private public school (school fees R12000), had well-qualified teachers, the best science laboratories, Internet connectivity at home, private tutors after school, an air-conditioned study and parents who were university graduates.

Ntombi Mafuse (school fees R800, if you can pay), from a derelict township school, had mainly unqualified teachers, never saw a science laboratory, took a taxi to town to use the cafe's Internet if and when she had the money, had no access to tutors, studied in her candle-lit bedroom full of noisy siblings and her mother dropped out of primary school a long time ago.

Of course it is not fair. In fact, it is outrageous that two talented young people in the same country could have such completely divergent education experiences in spite of the bountiful policies claiming that discrimination is a thing of the past.

Unfortunately, we have defined discrimination only as a matter of past policy on the part of the apartheid government, which under-funded and in other ways neglected black schooling.

In the case of Smart and Mafuse, and millions of others, the practice of discrimination remains a powerful factor in their life chances. In other words, for Mafuse, it really does not matter which government is in power - the educational (and economic) outcome she'd face would be exactly the same.

Education scholars have developed a useful term for this phenomenon: the "opportunity to learn". They use the relative quality of this opportunity as a basis for making judgments about pupils' achievements.

In other words, judgments are made not on the basis of a terminal exam (such as matric), but on the basis of the opportunities a pupil has been given to enable him to perform.

A student like Smart, who had an optimal learning opportunity, cannot, in this view, be judged by the same measure as Mafuse, who had minimal opportunity to learn.

To compare Smart and Mafuse on the basis of the same maths or science exam is not only patently unfair, it is dangerous.

The results confirm in Smart's mind that he is smarter and more deserving than Mafuse; and they confirm in Mafuse's mind that she is less able and less deserving than her counterpart at the well-heeled school.

The matric results not only predict the economic future of Smart and Mafuse, they also reproduce social inequality according to race and class in one of the most unequal nations in the world.

What concerns me is not so much the lack of a national plan to get us out of this mess. My distress derives from the fact that South Africans have come to accept the terms of this game.

We participate in the matric-exam circus like stagehands making sure that Tickie the Clown smiles through his heavy make-up; we pretend that the caged animals are not trapped and confined for most of the day but are delighted to come out and entertain the paying customers; we imagine that when the lights go out in the Big Top, everybody is happy and content.

We will pay a heavy price for this national delusion.