Cape Town - Safety at schools remains the biggest obstacle to education in the province and government is using technology to improve learning.
Education MEC Debbie Schäfer said that due to the long-term effects of poverty and inequality, many of the public schools in poorer communities needed extra support to management, teachers and pupils, as well as additional financial resources.
According to the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) annual report, 99% of the department’s R20 billion budget was spent.
Schäfer said that safety remained the biggest concern for the department and parents.
“It is a source of extreme concern to me that the criminal justice system just does not appear to be coping with the scale of the problem.
“And while we do everything we can as a provincial government, including preventative measures, we need measures to be taken by the relevant authorities to deal effectively with criminality.”
Three new schools were completed and handed over in 2017/18, namely iThemba Primary School, Eerste River High School and Cheré Botha Special School.
Five schools were replaced with new buildings, 47 classroom extensions were built at eight schools and 149 mobile units were provided.
Collaboration schools was launched in 2016 and used to bring better resources to poorer schools.
Schäfer said that at schools where the most resistance occurred to this project initially, it was agreed that the parents would get to vote on whether it should continue after one year.
“They voted in favour in both cases. The provincial government has provided high-speed broadband connectivity to almost every school in the province via a wide area network and alternative connectivity to schools that cannot connect to the fibre-optic grid.
“We have also provided local area networks in 135 schools and Wi-Fi connectivity for almost every site.
“A key benefit of eLearning is reducing the gap between poor and well-resourced schools, by improving access to the best education resources and support. E-learning can enable all our pupils and teachers to access modern technology, and in so doing more easily access a variety of resources that would otherwise not be available to them.”
Although the department received a clean audit, there was a R155 million underspend.
ANC Finance spokesperson Carol Beerwinkel said the large amount was concerning.
“It is less than 1% underspent, but I think will all the issues in our schools at the moment we need to be spending all the money we have optimally.”
DA MPL Lorraine Botha welcomed the R1.2bn allocation to providing support to 71 public schools for pupils with disabilities, accommodating 18 870 pupils from across the province, up nearly 10% from the previous financial year.