GDE’s failure to provide adequate resources to schools impacts negatively on online admission placement

5 October 2019

The Gauteng Department of Education’s (GDE) failure to effectively provide much needed resources to all schools across the province has impacted negatively on the online admission placement process.

The department has announced that the placement for the 2020 academic year has been extended to 30 November 2019.

The department has given the following reasons for extending the placement process:

Some of the parents have not yet submitted the documents required to process the applications and;

About 4700 parents have not yet accepted offers of placement.

Several learners have not yet been placed and some of the preferred schools have reached their capacity.

According to the department 411 schools have reached capacity and some of these schools have already extended their capacity to accommodate more learners.

The department must strike a balance between schools facing high enrolment demand and those schools which are standing empty.

Some schools have no space available, while some schools were declared full from day one of online registrations.

The biggest challenge is the lack of excellent schools hence the demand for enrollment in those few schools of excellence that are performing well.

The DA calls upon the Gauteng Education MEC, Panyaza Lesufi to focus on resourcing underperforming schools with adequate infrastructure, hiring qualified teachers and ensuring that there is good leadership in our schools.

By so doing it will enable those underperforming schools to compete with those which have a legacy of excellence; this will then change the perception of the parents when selecting schools for their children.

Issued by Khume Ramulifho, DA Gauteng Shadow MEC for Education, 5 November 2019