While schools continue to offer blended education in response to Covid-19, some private schools are now offering an online-only option.
And the option has offered a cost relief to parents as it's far less than it would have been, according to financial experts.
Curro, which has 15 physical schools in the province, announced in June 2020 that it would be offering an online-only school, as Covid-19 had changed the education landscape.
An independent advisory firm AlphaWealth said its research found that the cost of traditional private school education in South Africa averaged between R1.8 million and R8.7m over a child’s entire schooling career.
The figures excluded external necessities such as textbooks and uniforms.
CEO of AlphaWealth, Kerry Fynn, said: “Over time, we may see more top-rated private schools adapting to provide purely online offerings in an effort to retain admissions and remain competitive.”
The online offering comes at almost half of the traditional schooling fees.
“The Covid-19 pandemic hastened a trend that would have arrived eventually," added Fynn.
He said online schooling had been an option since long before the pandemic, with many established virtual offerings providing South African learners with alternatives to traditional schooling.
These included schools such as Brainline, Cambrilearn, Virtual Schools and Think Digital College.
Fynn believed that online schooling was a “sustainable option” for students who may live in remote areas, struggle with social or learning difficulties or who have chronic illnesses that make in-person learning a risk.
He said while the majority of schools might switch to solely in-person learning once the pandemic subsided, this was not set to happen "any time soon."
Fynn said the majority of schools offering a hybrid learning experience had not lowered their fees to "account for disruptions to in-person learning".
"Teachers are still doing just as much, if not more, work than they were doing previously, and schooling facilities still require upkeep, in addition to the cost of digital resources," he argued.
Education expert Professor Lesley Wood believed that the pandemic highlighted long existing inequalities in education and most learners in underprivileged schools were deprived of education during the hard lockdown.
"Children in under-resourced township and rural schools are not receiving, with a few exceptions, education at the same level of quality as those in former model C or private schools. Many teachers tried their best to send lessons via WhatsApp for instance, but you cannot compare this to Zoom lessons, incorporating educational apps etc. Also, the living conditions of the children were not often conducive to schooling from home," Wood said.
Wood added that even if data and devices were supplied, as they were for students in higher education, the less advantaged schools were not as geared to move the curriculum online.
"What is needed is an overhaul of the whole system, to ensure that there is quality management and teaching in schools, adequate infrastructure so that all kids get similar opportunities," Wood said.
He said the education budget was adequate to provide education, but "sadly much of it is wasted, or disappears at some point before it reaches the schools that need it".
Wood said some public schools could not even "offer face to face quality education in most cases".
Wood added that schooling was about "more than just passing exams – it is about learning social skills, becoming aware of your strengths, empathy, being able to live and work with others and this is more difficult to do via digital means".
Some private schools said while social behaviour was compromised as a result of the online tuition, reading and comprehension would not "necessarily have been affected".
"A lot of students in fact would have honed their critical literacy skills more through having more independent reading to do," said school head, Heather Goedeke.
She said the school would "essentially remain a face-to-face school".
"There has been some interesting research in this space, but numbers indicating an interest in a purely off-line experience are relatively few. We are intentionally focusing on supporting the need for a holistic education which involves spiritual, cultural and sporting activities on campus.
“Moreover, the birth of online teaching will most certainly give us options when pupils or staff are not able to be at school for legitimate reasons, so one could say that we are capable of providing a hybrid experience in the event of this being needed," Goedeke added.
Another school, Reddam House, said virtual learning that allowed for live interaction with teachers was "the next best thing to being in a classroom".
The Inspired education group has launched an online school, King’s College Online, which will also provide students aged 14 to 18.
Equal Education (EE) believed that given the "massive inequality" of access to resources such as computers, electricity, WiFi and learning spaces within homes for underprivileged pupils, careful consideration needs to be given the support made available to pupils and their parents and guardians through online and broadcast channels such as television and radio.
"All websites that provide educational content, particularly all the content on the websites of the provincial and national education departments, must be free to access," EE Researcher Hopolang Selebalo said.
Selebalo said, according to the Department of Basic Education’s (DBE) 2020 National Education Infrastructure Management System (NEIMS) report, only 4723 schools of over 23 000 public schools across the country, had access to the internet for teaching and learning.
Of the schools with access to the internet, Gauteng and Western Cape combined, made up over half.
Grandparent Mogamat Hendricks said now that his grandchildren were attending school on increased days than last year, the school work had also increased.
"My grandchildren coped well with online. We couldn't offer much assistance as this was a different ball game for us. But they coped and are happy to be back at school", Hendricks said.
Weekend Argus