BPT1501 Assignment 7 Portfolio 2023 (Answers)

BPT1501 Assignment 7 Portfolio 2023 (Answers) South Africa: Broken And Unequal Education Perpetuating Poverty And Inequality The South African education system, characterised by crumbling infrastructure, overcrowded classrooms and relatively poor educational outcomes, is perpetuating inequality and as a result failing too many of its children, with the poor hardest hit, according to a new report published by Amnesty International on Tuesday. Broken and Unequal: The State of Education in South Africa calls on the government to urgently address a number of endemic failings in the system in order to guarantee the right to a decent education for every child in South Africa. The report particularly highlights poor infrastructure in public schools including sanitation which has tragically resulted in the death of two children in pit latrines in recent years. “For South Africa to comply with both its own constitutional and international human rights obligations with respect to education, major change is needed urgently, “said Shenilla Mohamed, Executive Director of Amnesty International South Africa. “The right to quality education includes having a school where learners are safe to learn and have the adequate infrastructure and facilities to do so, but our research has found that this is not the reality for many learners in the country.” The report details how the education system continues to be dogged by stark inequalities and chronic underperformance that have deep roots in the legacy of apartheid, but which are also not being effectively tackled by the current government. For example, it brings to the fore that many schools and the communities they serve continue to live with the consequences of the political and economic decisions made during the apartheid era where people were segregated according to their skin colour, with schools serving white communities properly resourced. The result of this modern-day South Africa is that a child’s experience of education still very much depends on where they are born, how wealthy they are, and the colour of their skin. As the President prepares to deliver the State of the National Address this week, the critical question is: why is it that a child’s experience of education in South Africa still depends very much on where they are born, how wealthy they are, and the colour of their skin? While the report acknowledges that there has been progress made since the end of apartheid on widening access to education as well as other aspects, it has identified weaknesses by the Department of Basic Education, such as repeatedly failing to reach its own targets with respect to infrastructure and facilities. In these circumstances it is not surprising that educational outcomes remain relatively poor. For example, a recent international survey found that more than three quarters of children aged nine cannot read for meaning. In some provinces this is as high as 91% in Limpopo and 85% in the Eastern Cape. And of 100 learners that start school, 50-60 will make it to matric, 40-50 will pass matric, and only 14 will go to university. “South Africa has one of the most unequal school systems in the world. Children in the top 200 schools achieve more distinctions in mathematics than children in the next 6,600schools combined. The playing field must be levelled.” The right to quality education includes having a school where learners are safe to learn and have the BPT1501 SEMESTER 1 PORTFOLIO 2023 adequate infrastructure and facilities to do so, but our research has found that this is not the reality for many learners in the country. Broken promises In 2013, the government enacted the Minimum Norms and Standards for educational facilities, requiring the government to ensure that by November 2016, all schools have access to sanitation and electricity and that all pit latrines are replaced with safe and adequate sanitation and schools built from inappropriate materials, such as mud and asbestos are replaced. Yet as the government’s own statistics show, these targets have not been met. As the government continues to miss its own targets to improve learning facilities, Amnesty International’s research in Gauteng and the Eastern Cape found numerous examples of schools with poor infrastructure and lacking basic facilities. These included badly maintained buildings that had never been renovated, many of them dating back decades to the apartheid era and even previously. The buildings were hazardous, built with dangerous material such as asbestos and poorly maintained, in some cases putting the safety and security of learners at risk. The buildings were also unhygienic, poorly maintained and in some cases unsafe. Schools that were visited by Amnesty International had overcrowded classrooms without basic equipment and materials such as furniture and textbooks, with lack of security exacerbating the problem of vandalism and burglary. One of the key infrastructure issues is poor sanitation which compromises not just learners’ education but also their health, privacy and dignity. Amnesty International researchers found numerous examples of badly maintained, broken or unsanitary toilets, including pit latrines. Students who were interviewed by the organisation in Gauteng raised it as a particular concern, saying that in many cases toilets were “dirty” and “unhealthy”. In the Eastern Cape, issues of concern included lack of sufficient toilets forth number of pupils in line with the learner to toilet ratio of 1:30; lack of an adequate and/or reliable water supply often requiring use of a borehole; poor hygiene with associated health problems among learners; leaking septic tanks; broken sanitation infrastructure that could not be repaired owing to lack of funds and an inability to remedy vandalism or theft in sanitation facilities. “The fact that the Limpopo Department of Education says that it will take an estimated 14years to replace all pit latrines in the province’s public schools is shocking. Given the recent deaths, it is unacceptable that the government cannot guarantee that more children won’t die this year or any coming years for that matter,” said Mohamed. Beyond infrastructure, other barriers that children face to access a quality education include lack of sufficient transport, which often impacts on not just their ability to access education but also can put their safety at increased risk. Some children walk for between 30 minutes and an hour to get to their educational institution meaning it is likely to be more than 3km. This is despite the fact that the Department of Transport, in collaboration with the Department of Basic Education, is BPT1501 SEMESTER 1 PORTFOLIO 2023 required to ensure that transport is provided to grades R to 12pupils who live more than 3km from the nearest school. Children in the lowest income groups are also more likely to walk to school than those in the highest income group. In KwaZulu-Natal alone, where more learners walk to school than in any other province, more than 210,000 pupils walk for more than an hour each way, and 659,000 walk for between 30 minutes and an hour each way. When they do get to school, students are often being taught in overcrowded classes impacting on their ability to learn effectively. For example, Amnesty International saw many cases of teacher learning ratios exceeding the stipulated ratio of 1:35 increasing to double this figure in one case. Amnesty International visited numerous schools that had insufficient resources to meet the requirements for a decent education and this is borne out by the Department of Basic Education’s own statistics. According to the Department’s own statistics for 2018, out of 23,471 public schools,20,071 have no laboratory. Furthermore, 18,019 have no library, while 16,897have no internet. Almost1,000 schools have no sports facilities, while 4,358 have only illegal plain pit latrines for sanitation; 1,027 have no perimeter fencing, essential for teacher and pupil safety, while 239 have no electricity, and 37 have no sanitation facilities at all. In its recommendations, Amnesty International calls for the review and reform of how the education budget is distributed in order to achieve quality education for all and to combat entrenched inequality in the system. The repeated failure of government to address the issues is not only a question of accountability, it has consequences for the life chances of thousands of young people and the future of this country. Mohamed S.(2020). Available online. Accessed on 05/05/23 1. The above article has implications on teachers’ professionalism. Discuss these implications with refence to the following: (a) Teachers’ ethical convictions in supporting learners. (b) Teachers’ knowledge (c) Teachers’ working relationships within and beyond the classroom. (54) Your discussion should be at most 750 words. 2. Paragraph four of the above article identifies weaknesses by the department of education. Can the professional learning communities (PLC) strengthen the weaknesses? Give four reasons to support your answer. (13) Your discussion should be at most 350 words. Read an extract taken from the website and answer the questions based on this extract. My third-grade teacher passed away. Clara Barefoot Sehorn. That was her name. And as third graders, you can imagine the smirks and the giggles when we learned her middle name. But she didn’t care. She was proud of her name; her heritage; who she was. At a time when, as seven- and eight-year-olds, we were just learning about BPT1501 SEMESTER 1 PORTFOLIO 2023 the world outside our own backyards, and for me, a first-generation Filipino living in a very homogenous community, she helped us embrace our differences. Learning and working with others was a lesson that I’ve kept with me all through life. Our classroom smelled a bit earthy. The windowsills were lined with drying clay pinch pots. Paint brushes saturated with purple, green, and yellow glaze were soaking in the sink. In the back, was our beloved “Nest” – a reading corner piled with big pillows and books, inviting for any student to read, or rest our eyes, or, as Ms. Sehorn always encouraged us, to sit in the nest and “daydream something wonderful, then bring it to life.” We kept a chicken that laid eggs, incubated them and hatched them. We documented it all. We fed them from droppers and learned about the cycle of life and where our food comes from. Ms. Sehorn was different from the other teachers in the building. Lessons didn’t seem timed. The entire day seemed to flow. We’d take walks along the path in between the school and the neighbouring property where they kept horses. Thistles lined the path. Mount Saint Helen’s ash was still present. We picked up earth worms, potato bugs, dug up rock, clay, dirt, and soil. We composted and created our own garden. Everyone contributed. Every student felt a sense of ownership: a sense of pride in the things we dreamed up and created. That spring, President Ronald Reagan was assassinated … or so we worried. Our classroom gathered and watched in horror the news reports on the big roll-in tube TV on a cart. There were very few TVs at our school, but Ms. Sehorn insisted the importance of understanding what had happened. She was emotional. She was concerned. She talked about the importance of the office of the President; I remembered she said, “Even if I don’t agree with him, I respect the position of leadership.” She talked about guns and mental illness. Ms. Sehorn was honest and forthright. She took every moment to help open up our minds, consider the facts, learn to voice our thoughts, and formulate an opinion. I remember her beautiful smile; her energetic voice; her quick movements throughout the room. I can still feel the twinkle in her eye when she saw the spark in mine. Ms. Sehorn created a spark of curiosity with her experiential learning environment. She encouraged a creative spirit and desire to shine with bright colours amongst a sea of grey. She connected with us as learners. More importantly, she believed in us. She believed in me.” 3. Identify five (5) teaching and learning strategies that Ms Sehorn normally used in her classroom and give an example of how each strategy was used in her classroom. (20) 4. Mention two strategies you used to approach and write BPT1501 assignments. In each strategy give a reason why the strategy was successful or not successful. (8) TOTAL 100