Curriculum international accreditation refers to the recognisance of the particular country’s curriculum for international education institutions. This recognisance only happens after the degree of relevancy, pass requirements standards and quality assurance has been assessed and found worthy for accreditation by international education boards. This then means that any child who undertakes that particular curriculum qualifies to go study abroad and attend institutions of higher learning holding an internationally accredited Matric certificate. International accreditation on its own is a proof that the curriculum is highly relevant and thus, open doors for learners to study abroad should they feel a need to do so or even forced by circumstance to relocate abroad. This paper aims at investigating the reasons behind the South African National Curriculum Statement (NCS) failure to be an internationally accredited certificate (Matric certificate).
‘’The IEB matric certificate is an internationally portable qualification. This was made perfectly clear by the IEB and they provided the necessary statistics to substantiate their claim. The IEB pass rate is currently 98,57% and the degree pass rate 85,07%. The IEB is an internationally recognized qualification with IEB students studying all over the world at well-known and prominent academic institutions such as Berkeley, Brown, Harvard, Princeton, NYU, Exeter, Durham, Edinburgh, London School of Economics and Melbourne, to name a few.’’ George, Garden Route news
It is a painful narrative when you go abroad and your child is told that he/she is not at the level to enroll a certain grade of that particular country, and therefore should go to the grades lower than Grade the child was doing back home. This happens when you relocate to countries where education system is organized and in order. Also, it is a national education department problem because, in case of relocation, parents struggle to find schools and suitable grades for their children in new countries because of the standards of education system in south Africa. This raises a question of: If south African education system is relevant why is it not internationally accredited? If the NCS was a relevant curriculum and a certificate that holds water in its quality and pass requirement standards, it would be internationally accredited. Opening an easy space for relocations without worrying about schools and admissions thereafter!
Even accessing independent higher education institutions like Monash university – South Africa is a struggle for learners who hold NCS Matric certificate, while it is very easy for the learners holding IEB Matric certificate. This is because IEB is an internationally recognized curriculum that allows you to even study abroad. This is creating serious concerns about the status of quality assurance and relevancy of the NCS. How can a national curriculum system fail to raise the standards and get international recognisance? How are the parents supposed to trust and have confidence in a curriculum that boxes and locks a child within an average school with average infrastructure, attend an average university or college, and do an average job in an average country? NCS is truly a weak curriculum/policy, this curriculum is not designed to prosper learners. The curriculum is designed for the sake of schooling the children, and it doesn’t matter what they are schooled on and what the standards are, as long as children go to school. But what could be the reasons for NCS not internationally recognized?
The national curriculum statement (NCS) is not internationally recognized precisely because the curriculum is irrelevant. This curriculum is not preparing learners for the future. NCS is forcing learners to take subjects they do not need for their career paths. The curriculum is not skill focused, It’s based on theory and a highly limited amount of time on practical teaching and learning. NCS produces the workforce that even the local market can’t employ due to lack of skill. This curriculum is not designed with careful consideration of the individuality of a child and unique traits and talents of children. The curriculum believes children are the same and thus should be grouped together and undertake similar subjects. The curriculum further believes that one teacher is capable enough to reach out to 40 different learners in one classroom with 40 different career aspirations and 40 different interests in life. This teacher is using one teaching methodology and is obviously failing to reach out to all the learners. NCS sees nothing wrong with this. These are just a few, amongst, many reasons why NCS doesn’t even qualify to be internationally accredited or recognized.
At the information session held on Monday 10 November 2014, Sidiropoulos, an assessment specialist with the IEB said that the IEB and the state schools follow the same curriculum, but that their approaches vary significantly. With the professional support of the IEB, schools are empowered and encouraged to promote critical, creative and analytical thinking. Problem-solving and ‘thinking out of the box’ is what differentiates IEB pupils from others (https://www.georgeherald.com/news/News/General/91728/Clarity-on-IEB-curriculum).These are curriculum aspects the NCS lacks dismally. For instance, in countries like Finland, Canada, Singapore etc, a GR 8 leaner is academically matured enough to successfully tackle the NCS Gr10 content here in South Africa. But a NCS G12 learner in South Africa would need to go back to either Gr 10 or 9 in those countries to cope with their curriculum. Even teaching as a profession, in Finland you need a Master’s degree to qualify as a teacher, in south Africa you need a master’s degree to qualify as a lecturer, as a teacher, you just need a mere degree! That’s how the education system gap is between South Africa and these other countries. What is to be done therefore? The national government needs to introduce a new curriculum – personalized education curriculum system (PECS).
Personalized education curriculum system refers to the education system that caters for the unique personal traits and future desires of an individual child. It is an individualized curriculum system that seeks to fuel learners straight to their career path through a carefully designed program of assessment and an innovative teaching plan. Personalized education curriculum system means that education is theoretical – practical balanced and future orientated. This curriculum is a responsive tool that encourages individuality and is career path focused rather than mass education system, where aspiring lawyers, doctors, pilots, politicians, actuaries, chefs etc. are all in one classroom, taught by one teacher, with one teaching style. This is a curriculum system that seeks to protect a learner from doing irrelevant subjects from his/her career path – an engineer doesn’t need English literature (Romeo and Juliet or Hamlet) and Trigonometry and solve for x can be a stumbling block for an aspiring journalist or lawyer! This is a far-reaching education curriculum system that seeks to put learning and teaching into perspective.