Letter from the Editor – Siyabonga Memela

After a well deserved break I assume that everybody has had enough time to pause and reflect on last year’s achievements and shortfalls, and has devised plans on how to improve, based on the lessons learnt.

Some of the people who must have learnt something from last year’s shortfalls are the academic learners, educators and administrators. In order for this country and future generations to prosper we need a well educated nation, a nation that is able to confront the challenges of globalisation, inequality, and underdevelopment. Last year’s matric results are nothing to rejoice about. Some schools’ failure rate was 100%. That is a bad reflection on the learners, educators, parents and administrators. How can all the students in a class fail all the subjects? This is just too difficult to imagine, yet it happened. We have to ask ourselves under what circumstances do such things happen? We cannot plan for the future without knowing what happened yesterday.

It is shocking to hear from a local radio station that there were some schools that got it all wrong and got 100% wrong. As the talk show continued each caller hinted at possible causes, some blamed the learners who simply do not take their education seriously, some blamed the teachers for not being serious, and one blamed the politicians, saying they focus more on their luxurious lifestyles and neglect the future of the nation. To my surprise none of them ever said, “As parents we are also guilty of not taking the education of our children seriously.” They all just blamed the learners, educators, administrators or politicians.

Now is the time for parents to commit themselves fully to the education of their children. I am not referring only to those parents who have children at school. This refers to all parents, and in the spirit of ‘my child is yours too’. Ask yourselves what you can contribute to better the situation of the school your children attend? Paying school fees and participating in fundraising events is well appreciated but not good enough.

We need to continue to embrace efforts to find long-lasting solutions to the problem facing our educational system. I am certain that the collective wisdom of learners, educators, parents, administrators, and politicians can produce what everybody should be proud of – that is, an effective educational system for our country.

Enjoy the read!
Enjoy the flight!
Siyabonga Memela