Some no-fee schools in the country are dropping the subject Computer Applications Technology (CAT) due to not having computers, a report of the Department of Basic Education (DBE) has revealed.
This information has emerged just weeks after Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga insisted the country would not lag behind in introducing Fourth Industrial Revolution education at schools.
“The DBE does not believe that we are falling behind in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, since we are the country that is among the first in the world to develop a formal coding and robotics curriculum, which provides learners with the necessary skills and competencies,” said Motshekga in a parliamentary written reply last month.
The department started piloting the coding and robotics curriculum in Grades R to 3 and 7 during the third term of the 2021 academic year. It aimed to start teaching coding and robotics fully in these foundation phase grades next year.
The pilot in Grades 4 to 6 and Grade 8 commenced this year. The full-scale implementation for these grades is planned for 2024, and for Grade 9 in 2025.
Motshekga said the department was on track to phase in the coding and robotics curriculum.
But a report that the department submitted to Parliament’s portfolio committee on basic education recently has painted a worrying picture about the status of CAT teaching in no-fee schools.
The report said there was a decline in the number of learners learning CAT. The figure dropped by 13 157 learners from 2008 to 2020. This was a 26.7% decline.
“Only 6.2% of learners offered CAT in 2020, which is 3.8% less than in 2008,” said the report.
It said the “most important reasons for the decline in the CAT participation rate” included “ageing equipment, especially at no-fee schools”.
The problem “forces these schools to phase out the subject as they have no funds to replace/upgrade computer labs”, it added.
The schools lack funds or business plans to maintain the computer lab equipment, it said. It also listed maintenance costs, and the absence of technicians and network administrators, in this regard.
Acting president of the National Teachers Union (Natu) Sibusiso Malinga told The Star yesterday that the CAT problems that no-fee schools faced were due to the fact that provincial education departments had left them on their own to sustain the subject.
“The money that schools receive from the department annually is too meagre to enable them to repair, service and buy new computers,” Malinga said.
“Schools need to have maximum support from the department. In this case, there must be a programme for servicing computers in schools. Secondly, we have a challenge with computer teachers. A school becomes forced to drop CAT not because it’s not important, but because of a shortage of teachers. The department is not employing teachers.”
He said the coding and robotics subject stood to suffer the same fate as CAT if schools did not receive the utmost support.
“Coding and robotics are very important to our learners. But it’s no use to introduce them if we won’t go an extra mile to sustain them. There must be funding for all these subjects that we’re introducing.
“I’m quite worried that coding and robotics will only succeed in urban areas,” said Malinga.
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