Curro group stands by its principal

Published Jan 31, 2015

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Pretoria - The Curro group has said it will not take any action against the head of Curro Foundation School in Roodeplaat, Pretoria, who segregated pupils according to race.

The group said no action was necessary because the school principal “was under pressure” and had “a good heart”.

After a heated meeting with the parents of pupils in grades R, 1 and 2 on Thursday, Curro Holdings regional manager André Pollard said that the principal, John Bisset, had acted because of the “white flight” from the school.

Pollard said the school had been segregating the pupils according to race because white parents were withdrawing their children. He said he was surprised that parents were offended by the segregation because a number of schools across the country had the same policy.

“We need to be fair to Mr Bisset. He was pressured from different sides,” said Pollard.

“The decision taken was not only taken by him but by the whole staff. He was under pressure to accommodate the white learners at the school, and his suggestion was to put the minority in one class. The aim was to keep it as a multicultural school.”

He said Bisset was “a good man with a good heart” who put the needs of the children first.

Another criticism that the school received was that it did not hire enough black teachers.

Pollard said: “They don’t apply. What we find is that there are other opportunities for them to go faster in the ranks in the public schools.”

He said the school was now going on a recruitment drive for black teachers. Curro Foundation School was not the only school that separated pupils.

“We did not do it to harm anybody. At the end of the day it caused the parents to be upset. We are willing to accommodate one another. We need to start to trust one another and we will be able to build a better country.”

Traumatic

Pollard said the solution at the school would be for all parents and pupils to go through a diversity programme.

Some black parents also complained that the school had held a whites-only parents meeting. Pollard said that the meeting had been for all parents and was part of the preparation for moving pupils into mixed classes. He said that moving pupils could be a traumatic experience.

“The reason why it is traumatic is that you cannot remove children from their friends. You cannot all of a sudden take a child out of a class where his dear friend is to another class,” he said.

On Tuesday there will be another parents meeting at which representatives from each grade will be chosen to come up with ways to resolve the matter.

On Monday, Gauteng Education MEC Panyaza Lesufi will visit the school. Lesufi and the SA Human Rights Commission are investigating the school.

The trouble started when a group of 30 parents signed a petition demanding to know why some classes were made up entirely of black pupils and others of white pupils. The school said this was not an attempt at racial segregation but that there was a small number of white pupils and it wanted them to make friends with others who shared their culture.

Grade R fees are about R24 000 a year, and Grade 1 fees are about R42 000. This excludes aftercare, textbooks and extramural activities.

The Curro group has 41 schools across the country.

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