76.4 percent of Gauteng matrics pass

By Mirah Langer

The Gauteng matric pass rate increased in 2008 to 76.4 percent compared with last year's 74.6 percent, said the provincial education department on Tuesday.

"Given the challenges we had, I am proud to say in Gauteng I think we have done extremely well," MEC Angie Motshekga told a press briefing.

The briefing was attended by acting premier Mandla Nkomfe, various government officials, union representatives, parents and matriculants in Johannesburg.

She said her dream had been to obtain an 80 percent pass rate.

"I am not a bad student, I got 76.4 percent."

Motshekga said what made her proud was the quality of passes amongst the candidates.

Over 92,000 students wrote matric in the province.

Of these 30.44 percent passed with endorsement that would allow them to enter university. This is an approximate 10 percent increase from last year where only 20.41 percent of matric candidates would have been able to pursue a bachelor's degree.

Just over 26,000 of the 2008 matric candidates can now study towards a diploma and just over 16,000 can study towards a certificate.

A total of 21,814 matric candidates failed.

Motshekga said if these students had failed less than two subjects they could re-write in February.

There is no new year just sit and prepare," she said was her message to these students.

Motshekga said there were 139 schools in the province which had achieved a pass rate below 60 percent. One hundred and three schools showed an improvement in the pass rate in 2008 and 33 percent of these showed an improvement of more than 25 percent.

Seven of Gauteng's 15 districts achieved a pass rate below the provincial average. The best performing district was Tshwane South with a pass rate of 83.97, while the worst performing was Sedibeng West with a 61 percent pass rate.

Motshekga said the National Senior Certificate examinations for the year had been declared credible and reliable by Umulusi, the quality assurance council for general and further education.

Motshekga said there was evidence that students migrated to study in Gauteng from other parts of the country, as well as coming from neighbouring countries.

High school registrations had increased 16.9 percent in 2008 compared to last year.

"The increase of 16.9 percent would have placed significant strain on the system in terms of resource output".

Motshekga told the media that new laws around pregnancy and school meant that the education system was able to prevent more girls from dropping out before writing matric.

"There is higher retention amongst girls. The majority of [matriculants] are girls."

Motshekga said 2008 was a major year in South Africa's education history with the new curriculum firmly in place.

The 2008 class was characterised as being the first cohort of students which had 12 years of schooling with the revised curriculum. All of the students in public schools would have been provided with seven textbooks, one for each subject in matric.

They would also have all written either mathematics or mathematical literacy as a subject.

"We have reached our milestone in finally getting rid of our old system of education which was fragmented and relied mostly on rote learning and ushered in an education system that affords all South African children across race, religion and creed opportunities to access modern, innovative and creative curriculum."

Attending the briefing were several of the province's top-achieving matriculants both overall and for maths and science specifically.

Several of the students had achieved full marks for mathematics.

Some dressed in uniform and others in "civvies", some appeared shy in front of the media cameras while other grinned broadly when asked to come on stage.

Motshekga said she was proud that several of these top achievers were now "children of colour" - something she said had evolved since she had been in office.

Motshekga said this was her last matric briefing as MEC as she was coming to the end of her term of office.

"It was fulfilling and I am grateful for all the support I've got," she said, also thanking her husband, children, parents and a teacher who had once taught her English at school who was in the audience.

On Tuesday, the Democratic Alliance said there was a "giant question mark" around the significance of Gauteng's marginally improved matric results.

"Do matriculants have the skills to get jobs, and can they get into university without writing an additional entrance exam?" said DA education spokesman David Quail.

Quail said it was difficult to compare the results of the new Outcome-Based-Education curriculum with previous years, so the DA believed the credibility of the results was in doubt.

"Education authorities need to stop tinkering with elaborate plans and get back to the basics in education, to produce matriculants who can read, write and count.

"Far too many of our schoolchildren can't read and write at internationally acceptable levels," he said.

Sapa