Durban - The government has apparently buckled under teacher union pressure and withdrawn plans by Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga to have matric exam markers write competency tests this year.
Educationists said the credibility of the National Senior Certificate was at stake, but Motshekga’s department said that the finalising of a draft policy to root out inept examiners had only been delayed to address “valid” concerns raised by unions.
The draft policy stipulates that prospective matric exam markers who score below 60 percent on the competency test not be allowed to grade matric answer scripts.
When it was published for public comment in the Government Gazette last year, a spokeswoman for Motshekga said the motive for the policy was to prevent pupils from being disadvantaged, and to address marking inconsistencies identified by exam quality watchdog Umalusi.
In their report on the 2011 National Senior Certificate, Umalusi expressed concern about the standard of marking.
In KwaZulu-Natal, for example, while Umalusi commended the province on its mark-capture system, it discovered that a maths literacy pupil was short-changed by 16 marks because of inconsistencies and inaccuracies.
The SA Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) and the National Teachers’ Union (Natu) have been vehemently opposed to the competency tests.
In reply to a parliamentary question from DA MP Annette Lovemore, Motshekga’s department said that, while initially the competency tests were set to be written by teachers in all nine provinces in time for this year’s matric exam, there was a need for further consultation with “one of the teachers’ unions” that had been against the idea, before finalising the policy.
Sadtu general secretary Mugwena Maluleke said the competency tests “were not going to make pupils pass” and that the tests would “humiliate” teachers who Motshekga’s department had neglected to capacitate through professional development training.
He said Motshekga’s department had its priorities wrong by focusing on marking skills.
Natu deputy president Allen Thompson labelled the competency tests “an insult”.
However, the National Professional Teachers’ Organisation of South Africa (Naptosa) believed the competency tests were “essential”.
“It is about giving children a fair chance. It will also help schools to know whether teachers are competent enough to teach matric.
There is evidence (recent major research) that teacher content knowledge is not what it should be. There are many ways to go about administering the tests, without unnecessarily embarrassing teachers,” said Naptosa president Basil Manuel.
KZN Education Department head Nkosinathi Sishi warned against “throwing the baby out with the bathwater”.
“The tests, if administered correctly, and taking into account the dignity of teachers, are a developmental tool. It shouldn’t be used to name and shame teachers. It is an important quality assurance measure. We have seen people with high qualifications and experience still make errors,” Sishi said.
Paul Colditz, the head of the Federation of Governing Bodies of South African Schools (Fedsas), said parents, pupils, universities and employers wanted assurance that the credibility of the National Senior Certificate was beyond doubt.
“We need credible assessors, it’s as simple as that. Many of the moderators I come into contact with say there are serious problems with consistency (in marking),” Colditz said.
Tim Gordon, the head of the Governing Body Foundation, repeated what he previously told The Mercury - that it was likely that “considerable” numbers of pupils had been unfairly disadvantaged as a result of poor subject knowledge and a lack of marking and evaluation competencies.
“Markers who lack the depth of knowledge expected don’t recognise the valid inputs of a top-quality candidate where their answers aren’t identical to those on the memorandum,” Gordon said.
Basic Education Department spokesman Panyaza Lesufi said some of the concerns raised by various teacher unions were valid, such as providing training to those teachers who scored poorly on the competency tests.
He said that the department was determined to finalise the policy and was only withdrawing it, not scrapping it completely.
The Mercury