This follows the latest article Online news (eNCA) that 11 million people in South Africa are unemployed! – (Thursday 12 November 2020). The information was presented by Statistics SA that South Africa’s unemployment rate increased by 7,5 percentage points to 30,8 percent. The expanded unofficial employment rate is 43.1 percent. This simply means that almost half of the nation of South Africa is unemployed, which is a horrifying statistic! As Simnandi education independent group, we are looking at the education perspective of this calamity and we want to see if South African education system has done justice in terms of driving the employment mandate in this country.
Besides the obvious fact that poverty in south Africa is an engineered consequence by the wealth discriminators who continue to enjoy the wealth upper hand over everybody, unemployment cant solely be blamed on race and other form of discriminatory measures that have been used to sideline our people from fighting poverty. Education systems are designed to combat poverty and unemployment. Education is the vehicle to change the circumstances for the better. Education is meant for transformation. The market depends upon education to have an enticing workforce that is skilled and relevant for the job. Thus, this drastic unemployment rate increase is fittingly blamed on the irrelevancy of the education system of our country. The weakness of the South African education curriculum is a major contributing factor to this unemployment rate.
Education in South Africa and its curriculum is answering the question nobody asked. The answer this curriculum system is giving, is that all learners with different traits, different abilities, different desires, and different ambitions should be grouped together in one confined classroom and be taught by one boring teacher. This teacher is perhaps coming from a theology perspective of world view, now all learners hear about is religion as an answer to everything in this world! Aspiring lawyers, accountants, engineers, public servants learn absolutely nothing from this educator because they are not catered for under the perspective from which an educator comes form.
This system teaches subjects that are not even close to helping a learner reach his/her potential. The subjects taught are totally irrelevant from the desired career path of learners. These subjects are mandatory to take, the system overlooks the individualistic traits and desires of the child and force all learners to do the same thing! An aspiring accountant, engineer, actuarial scientist at school does not need English literature (novels, drama, and poetry). Accounting and clients` accounts handling does not need any English literature knowledge or background. There`s no connection nor any form of relationship or link between engineering and English literature. Forcing an aspiring actuarial scientist to undertake Shakespearean works is educational injustice. An engineer will not need essay writing skills to carry out the duties of an engineering tasks. Poetry, novels, and drama/plays remain irrelevant for a learner inspired to be an actuarial scientist. This is how curriculum is irrelevant in SA – every learner, with different aspirations and different capabilities is fed the same curriculum – it’s like dosing, different patients carrying different sicknesses, the same medication, it is disastrous!
A learner interested in drama and art (Actor/Actress/recording artist/visual artist etc.) doesn’t need Mathematics nor do they need physics and almost all the subjects they are doing except English, Business studies and Life Orientation. Solve for x is remains an irrelevant aspect of learning for such a type of a learner and it shouldn’t be forced upon him/her. According to NCS curriculum regulations, a learner like this can pass both languages (HL & FAL) and LO and fail the rest, the child will not progress even though he/she passed languages and LO, subjects that are more relevant to Drama and Art. This is the curriculum pain the learners are faced with under NCS – subjects irrelevant from learners` aspirations determine whether learners progress or not. That is how irrelevant the curriculum is in south African schools. How then do you expect the unemployment rate to be low while schooling system is indirectly contributing to raising it to where it is today!
The market is having it hard to employ our graduates because of lack of skills. The education system does not teach skills, it gives theory over practical learning. This, in turn, makes it hard for the market to employ the graduates. That is another reason the unemployment rate is high, education system must be held accountable – instead of it being a solution, it is a problem! Education should be self-mandated to partner up with the market for the Work Integrated Learning (WIL-Practicals) for all career paths as per learners ‘various choices. Practical learning must be strictly part of the curriculum (theoretical learning in the classroom balanced with practical learning at the workplace). To ensure this theoretical-practical learning process, the education ministry should have WIL programme. WIL programme means that the market (employers- all businesses, private and public institution, and organizations etc.) will have education programmes with appointed personnel, where they regulate all the practical learning for the learners. The programme can be part of their Corporate Social Investments (CSI) and must prioritize on education advancement. This programme can run during school holidays with proper time framing and constant communication between the ministry (schools) and the market.
In conclusion, we believe that the market is the pillar of education system and the government is the custodian supervising it. The above insight proves the major role the market has in our education. It further reveals how meaningful education can be, should the market be directly involved with education in our country (South Africa). For instance, an aspiring lawyer never sees the courtroom until employed or at the higher education level, Accounting students only work with practical transactions and account handling when employed etc. Education should be practical, not only theoretical-the balance is needed! Personalized education curriculum system (PECS) is the answer to this unemployment rate!
Know more about PECS: https://simnandisolutions.co.za/personalized-education/ – Click on PECS PowerPoint presentation.
Please answer these 3 questions and submit: https://simnandisolutions.co.za/pecs-questionnaires/