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Address:Steve Vukile Tshwete Education Complex, Zone 6, Zwelitsha,
Province of the Eastern Cape, Republic of South Africa
On the 30 August 2017 principals from Chris Hani West District gathered in Queenstown for the Last Push Campaign.
This campaign is built on a three-year turnaround National Senior Certificate (NSC) strategy which was developed in February 2017. The aim is to improve the quality of pass rate and increase pass rate in 2017 National Senior Certificate (NSC).
According to the Deputy Director – General, Educational Planning,Evaluation and Monitoring (EPEM) Penny Vinjevold it is very important that the 2017 learners know what it takes to pass the NSC. “It is very important that the learners know their strengths and weaknesses so that they are able to work harder on the subjects that they find difficult,” said Vinjevold in her opening statement.
From the 84 000 enrolled Matriculants, a minimum of 52 000 NSC pass is expected and 16 000 should be Bachelor Pass.
“Eastern Cape Department of Education (ECDoE) and Schools cannot improve results if they don’t know the number of learners,” explained Vinjevold. “The Department has all results of all the candidates from term 1 and 2, principals and teachers should use this data to identify those who are borderline candidates and concentrate more on them and not only the progressed leaners,” added Vinjevold. She said the same data would be used to set targets for the number of leaners to pass and achieve Bachelors Pass in 2017,” said Vinjevold.
She further explained that it is very important to involve parents in this campaign in order for it to work.
Grade 12 Learners must be allowed to use their text books and study guides until the day they write that subject. The books should be handed over on the day of the examination, “this gives learners more time to study and get ready for that particular subject.”
“Learners should know what to expect on the day of their examination so that they don’t get surprised in the examination room as this will cause stress and panic when they don’t know what is expected of them, explained the DDG. “They should by now know their examination time table by heart,” concluded Vinjevold.
The Eastern Cape Department of Education has today signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Eastern Cape Education Development Trust (ECEDT) in an endevour to provide a lasting solution for the location and organization of all donor partnerships for the Department.
The ECDCT is a long-standing initiative started in 1998 as a mechanism to draw funding for all education relateddonor ships on behalf of our icon and erstwhile president, Nelson Mandela. It was a platform meant to manage business initiative to support education in providing development support.
The trustees have now agreed that it would be most ideal to establish a local office, based in Berea, East London, that will work with the Department. The signing of the MoU is a culmination of all the back-office preparation, and it outlines how the partnership will be structured in enabling a conducive environment for donor investments.
Ms. Anne-Lise Bollaert-Davies, the Executive Manager for the Trust says the partnership is meant to provide coordination, monitoring and evaluation of all donor partnerships. It will also strengthen endevours to source funding for critical support educational aspects including teacher development and providing needed synergy within the sector. “ Turning around education in the Province cannot be left to the Department alone”, said Bollaert-Davies. “The ECDT is but one small cog that will bring together the education Department and business to intervene decisively in through a focused footprint in the Province,” she said.
The Trust hopes for an ambitious model that create centres of excellence with a whole school development model that starts at Early Childhood Development Phase right up to post matric level. “That would ensure that the schools as centres of excellence would equally be mirrored a concomitant development of communities of excellence.
In signing the MoU, on behalf of the Department, the Superintendent General, Temba Kojana said “This is indeed an important milestone for the Department. The focused coordination and evaluation of our partnerships will ensure that our donors get value for money for their social responsibility commitments.”
The trust aims to retain and continue to operate as an independent separate entity with its own character and brand values. This will ensure that it is able to operate with the required stealth and urgency unencumbered by the bureaucratic time lapses that are an unfortunate weakness of governmental processes.
The Eastern Cape Department of Education hosted the Natural Sciences and Technology Olympiad 2017, where 51 learners participated from 17 Education districts, at the Education Leadership Institute in East London on the 25 August 2017.
This initiative started in 2014, and learners compete on three different levels, first they compete within their schools, where 3 top performers are chosen to represent their schools at district level. “Today we see the winners of the districts competing in the Provincial Olympiad,”said M Zihlangu, Subject Advisor at Amathole East. According to him, the Olympiad gives learners exposure and prepares them to participate in the national programmes of South African Association of Science and Technology Education (SAASTE) “Since the inception of this programme, the participation of districts has increased,” added Zihlangu. “It has also helped improve learner performance, the questions in Olympiads open the minds of learners about the content of science,” concluded Mahlangu.
Each participating learner was given a common paper with about 60 questions to complete within a certain amount of time; thereafter marking and moderation was done immediately to determine the winners. Should there be a tie, as experienced in today’s Olympiad, learners are given a rewrite until there is a clear winner. In this case two rewrite had to be done as one refused to back down. After a nail biting session only one became victorious.
Subsequent to an intense three rounds of silence there was an eagerness for results which saw three learners emerging as the overall winners, taking the number 1,2 and 3 positions. The number one spot was taken by Ayanda Ntantam from Mthatha, followed by Sebabatso Manka from Sterkspruit and ended off with Uviwe Sinomthombo from Queenstown, who took second and third place.
With a noticeable amount of districts that do not participate in the Olympiad, the Department has made it a priority to employ subject advisors and Education Development Officers (EDOs) that speak to these programmes. A bulletin has already been put out for all the aforementioned posts.
According to Subject Advisors, young minds need to be nurtured hence these programmes.
Eastern Cape Department of Education (ECDoE), has embarked on a journey to be informative through their wellness programmes, as experienced by lady departmental officials at the Womens Day celebrations, held in East London recently.
With an increase in diabetes, high blood pressure and general ills, the Wellness Directorate works hard in ensuring physical activities for employees to take part in, such as aerobics, netball, soccer and fun games. Not only concentrating on physical activities, but also causes of such illnesses. Wellness invited a host of professionals to speak on eating patterns and how that can affect performance at the work place, an audiologist, Virgin Active, GEMS and the benefits they offer to government employees, tips and ideas that can be texted directly to the phone on ideas for exercise at the work place.
As the ECDoE services hundreds of thousands of employees, stakeholders and clients, they too touched on the mental wellbeing of employees and how interpersonal relations affect the work place environment, what we can do to better those relationships, avoid animosity and a poor working environment. They shared best working practices and how to keep emotions in check. After a day filled with fun, laughter and a wealth of knowledge, lady government officials went away feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the responsibilities they have of servicing the Eastern Cape. The day went into night ending with a cocktail gala dinner which saw women dressing to the nines, to celebrate the women of 1956 and the current generation that is.
This occasion was graced by the presence of highly influential women within the sphere of government. Present amongst others were, Deputy Mayor Councilor Z Matane, Buffalo City Metro Municipality and Member of the National Council of Provinces, Zoleka Capa.
A breakdown of the Employment Equity Report was also presented which gave a clear indication of the number of women employed by the Department in specific positions compared to their male counterparts.
It was interesting to note that, very few women occupy Senior Management positions as opposed to males. The employment equity statics reveal that no woman is employed at salary level 15 and 16, only 4 at salary level 14 and 11 at salary level 13. Compared to their counterparts the numbers tell a different story where 3 males are at salary level 15 and 16, 6 at salary level 14 and 30 at salary level13.
It is evident that more still needs to be done in terms of elevating women to positions of leadership. One can only hope that the agenda of transformation will accelerate placement of more women in leadership positions.
“WATHINT’ ABAFAZI WATHINT’ IMBOKOTHO”
The Nelson Mandela Education district will tomorrow, August 29, 2017 host the Last Push Project team at the Ethel Valentine Hall at 10:00 am.
The department’s visit to the district is meant to assess and support the district schools after having identified gaps during the assessment period in preparation for the upcoming final examinations.
According to the Deputy Director General: Institutional Operations Management (IOM), Ray Tywakadi, the visit by these multi disciplinary teams in this district seeks to ensure that all schools and learners are prepared for these upcoming examinations.
“Our focus at this moment is to close the identified gaps in our schools so that we can have better output and change our results this year”, said Tywakadi
Details of the event are as follows:
Date: 29 August 2017
Venue: Ethel Valentine Hall (Port Elizabeth district)
Time: 10:00 am
The media is especially invited to witness the department turning the corner and providing leadership to districts and schools.
The Eastern Cape Department of Education Office of the Superintendent General (SG) has embarked on a Last Push Programme, which aims at monitoring and supporting districts to increase the quality of 2017 matric pass rate. This programme is set to run from the 17-23 August 2017, in all 12 Education Districts.
With the ECDoE Superintendent General, Themba Kojana in the forefront, he is encouraging circuit managers and principals to work together in reaching a minimum of 52 000 National Senior Certificate (NSC) passes and 16 000 Bachelor passes.
The programme is designed in such a way that it brings about change through intervention strategies framed within these Last Push gatherings. Some of the critical points that are looked at are: an analysis of Grade 12 results, term 1 and 2 with a Provincial overview of the results as presented by Acting Chief Director for Assessment and Exams, Mzimhle Mabona, suggesting to the district offices to maximize the efficient use of applications provided to collect and analyze DATA. The Department is making strides in ensuring that information is available at their fingertips, hence the launch of the Data Driven Districts programme (DDD).
According to Mabona, one does not have to be physically present at schools in order to access information on what is happening in Eastern Cape schools. This allows the Provincial Office to get a true reflection of what goes on, on the ground and provide assistance where needed.
Mabona further stressed that the importance of communication between principals, circuit managers and District offices for proper and balanced information flow.
SG Themba Kojana addressed the officials, highlighting three main issues that need to be strengthened and focused on, which includes:
“We are learning about the new interventions that districts are going to undertake for the Last Push, as head office we will be supporting the initiatives of the districts after they have been discussed between the senior management with the principals at schools,” said Kojana as he pointed out the following three concepts with circuit managers and principals:
He went on to say, “We will ensure that we support learners in our endeavors to ensure that we have quite a number of our learners who pass matric with quality passes.”
“The rise and fall of us depends on you,” concluded Kojana.
By: Nobulali Sigabi and Cheera-Dee Robinson
A two-day training session on Data Driven Districts Dashboard (DDD) programme took place on the 22-23 August 2017 for Personal Assistants (PAs) and Office Managers from Head Office and Districts at Mpekweni Resort near Port Alfred
The DDDD programme is managed by New Leader Foundation and it is a Data visualization aimed at assisting the Eastern Cape Department of Education (ECDoE) in identifying the overall performance of schools. This means the Department will be able to pin point the problem areas at schools and will be able to assist those that are in need before they get to a point of no return.
“This is not only meant for underperforming schools, DDD programme is also a tool that will help the ECDoE to identify those schools that are performing well,” said Monki Gabashane from New Leader Foundation. “If the DDD is used correctly, it will help the Office Managers and Personnel Assistants to give accurate data to their managers, which will help them a great deal when reporting about the progress of their schools,’’ added the energic Gabashane who was one of the facilitators on the day.
Gabashane explained that the only thing that is important with this programme is that the data capturers will be able to feed the system with the correct information as everyone will rely on it. “If the data is false that means the report will be incorrect. It is of outmost importance that the correct information is given by schools”
When asked about the training and what they have learned, Mandisa Notwala from Chris Hani West District said, “it was useful, informative and relevant to my work”. “I will no longer run after colleagues for reports, with just a click of a button, I will get all the data I need”. Zisiwe Ntotela from Head Office added, “it was really fruitful and informative”. It reduces the level of visits to districts and we will be able to draw reports from the system and also to confront the schools if there is no educator or learner attendance. This system also gives us an opportunity to assist the schools to fill gaps”.
A two-day training session on Data Driven Districts Dashboard (DDD) programme took place on the 22-23 August 2017 for Personal Assistants (PAs) and Office Managers from Head Office and Districts at Mpekweni Resort near Port Alfred
The DDDD programme is managed by New Leader Foundation and it is a Data visualization aimed at assisting the Eastern Cape Department of Education (ECDoE) in identifying the overall performance of schools. This means the Department will be able to pin point the problem areas at schools and will be able to assist those that are in need before they get to a point of no return.
“This is not only meant for underperforming schools, DDD programme is also a tool that will help the ECDoE to identify those schools that are performing well,” said Monki Gabashane from New Leader Foundation. “If the DDD is used correctly, it will help the Office Managers and Personnel Assistants to give accurate data to their managers, which will help them a great deal when reporting about the progress of their schools,’’ added the energic Gabashane who was one of the facilitators on the day.
Gabashane explained that the only thing that is important with this programme is that the data capturers will be able to feed the system with the correct information as everyone will rely on it. “If the data is false that means the report will be incorrect. It is of outmost importance that the correct information is given by schools”
When asked about the training and what they have learned, Mandisa Notwala from Chris Hani West District said, “it was useful, informative and relevant to my work”. “I will no longer run after colleagues for reports, with just a click of a button, I will get all the data I need”. Zisiwe Ntotela from Head Office added, “it was really fruitful and informative”. It reduces the level of visits to districts and we will be able to draw reports from the system and also to confront the schools if there is no educator or learner attendance. This system also gives us an opportunity to assist the schools to fill gaps”.
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