Durban - AN Estcourt woman who decided to complete matric at 36 is struggling to get feedback from the Department of Education after her report reflected she had not written Afrikaans and had failed two subjects.
Ureshma Ramdan said her life had been put on hold since 2016 due to the department’s alleged inefficiency.
“I left school in Grade 11 to work at a local supermarket to ease the financial burden at home. I considered this a temporary measure and assumed I would get a better paying job later on.
“But that thinking ended up being a rude awakening for me. I’ve instead learned about the importance of education the hard way,” said Ramdan.
“Without a matric certificate no one wanted to hire me permanently, so in 2016 I registered to write Grade 13. It is a supplementary examination for those who did not complete matric.”
Her subjects, she said, included English, Afrikaans, geography, history, life science, and business studies.
“I worked hard and studied to the best of my ability and wrote the examination at my old high school, Drakensberg Secondary.”
But when she received her results, she claimed her Afrikaans mark was omitted from the result sheet.
“It indicated that I did not write the paper and in addition to this, my history and geography marks were low. Something did not feel right. Without an Afrikaans mark, it meant I failed the entire examination.”
She said she contacted the Department of Education about the Afrikaans mark omission and was allegedly told it would investigate and get back to her.
Ramdan then borrowed R400 to have her history and geography papers remarked. Two years later, she said, she had neither received feedback about Afrikaans nor the results of the remarked papers.
“When I contact their offices, they push me from one person to another. This is going on for far too long. I call them at least three times a week and sent them a formal letter, but still no answers.”
She said she cared for her elderly and sick mother and had rent and utility bills that needed to be paid.
“We are barely making it financially. At the age of 36, I decided to take the plunge and complete matric to get a permanent job and take care of our household, but I’m in the same situation I started out in.
“I need someone to take this matter seriously and stop treating it like it does not matter. I want to make my life better but I am being stopped because the department is not doing its job.”
The department had not commented at the time of publication, despite being given Ramdan’s examination number and the query on Friday.