Regardless of the heavy rains that destroyed its schools infrastructure, the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Education confirmed that it was ready to conduct the 2022 National Senior Certificate (NSC) Exams.
Education MEC Mbali Frazer announced the province’s matric state of readiness at a media briefing at Inanda Seminary School on Tuesday.
“The Department of Education in KwaZulu-Natal is ready to administer the 2022 National Senior Certificate (NSC) examinations for the 198 866 full and part time candidates,” she said.
She said while they were on the ground running, teachers hard at work, learners attending classes with implementation of the academic improvement plan, their province was hit by torrential rains that led to the floods - not only destroying school infrastructure but also pupils losing their learning time.
“As a department, we had to ensure that the recovery plan is put in place to ensure that we recover the time lost during the floods,” she said.
She said that KZN had the biggest education system in the country, with 6 022 invigilators to manage the writing of the exams in 1 780 centres.
“The distribution of examination material will be done through 13 nodal points and 103 distribution and collection centres. The Province of KwaZulu-Natal will print 120 question papers, which will total 34 million pages.
“There will be 28 morning and 27 afternoon sessions in the 2022 National Senior Certificate exams,” she said.
She said their 2022 academic year started with a sense of relief and optimism, unlike the 2020 and 2021 academic years.
Frazer said for the class of 2022 to be ready and sharpened for the end of the year exams, the department developed the 2022 Academic Improvement Plan whose objectives were in line to improve the pass rate percentage from 76.8% to a maximum of 100%, if not minimum of 80%.
“However, the reality is that there are other factors which sometimes make it difficult to pass all our learners in the system and that is where we say, if we don’t attain 100%, we need to ensure that we do not obtain less than 80%, which will still be a great improvement from the 2021 NSC results,” she said.
She said part of their academic plan was to increase the number of schools that obtained a 100% pass rate, improve Bachelor passes by 5% and improve passes in mathematics, sciences and other technical subjects.
The MEC said they had winter class to prepare pupils and ensure that they were ready for the final exams.
The winter tuition aimed at facilitating effective curriculum coverage for both teachers and learners, it also achieved the following:
• To provide opportunity for learners to revise their work, attempt previous examination papers and consult with their teachers before.
• To provide a platform for schools to cluster learners/schools of the same level of performance and deal with common challenges.
• To expose learners in camps to effective study methods after tuition sessions.
• To familiarise learners to all the levels of questioning, in line with the standards of the National Senior Certificate Examinations.
• To deal with the challenges of under-performance in subjects as identified in the 2021 diagnostic reports and during first quarter assessment, especially in gateway subjects in economic management, natural, mathematics and social Sciences as well as high enrolment languages.
She maintained that the department would do well in these exams.
“We want to thank our primary trusted resource, our educators, for the sterling work and for their dedication that they always displayed, sometimes under very difficult conditions.
“Our gratitude also goes to organised labour for the passion not only for the interest of educators, but for the well-being and academic excellence of the children of KwaZulu-Natal.
“Our relationship with organised labour is encouraging and is among the reasons why as a department we say we are ready for the 2022 NSC exams,” she said.
She urged the people of KwaZulu-Natal to protect schools in their areas from those who wanted to turn them into playgrounds for criminal activities.
“We are also, once again, appealing to communities to desist from disrupting schools or blocking our learners and educators on their way to school during protests.
“Our children must not be denied their right to education because of conflicts that have nothing to do with them such as service delivery issues and faction fights,” she stated.
She further thanked education officials and stakeholders in KZN for making sure that all protocol was observed ahead of the exams.
She wished the class of 2022 the best of luck in their exams.
kamogelo.moichela@inl.co.za
Education