Teacher shortages likely in Gauteng
13 November 2008, 08:13
By Angelique Serrao
Many Gauteng's public schools will start the new year with too few teachers to fill their classrooms. Principals say a delay in staff appointments until April 2009 will leave many classes without teachers. And it's emerged that some schools won't have principals.
Democratic Alliance MPL for education David Quail said one school needed seven teachers next year.
Quail said every year there were problems and delays in filling vacant teaching posts, but this year the problems had been exacerbated because the Gauteng department of education has delayed the process by four months.
/>
Many Gauteng's public schools will start the new year with too few teachers to fill their classrooms. Principals say a delay in staff appointments until April 2009 will leave many classes without teachers. And it's emerged that some schools won't have principals.
Democratic Alliance MPL for education David Quail said one school needed seven teachers next year.
Quail said every year there were problems and delays in filling vacant teaching posts, but this year the problems had been exacerbated because the Gauteng department of education has delayed the process by four months.
According to Quail, in previous years a gazette with advertised posts for the next year was released in April, and principals knew by October who their teachers would be, so they could plan timetables for the following year.
This year the gazette was only released in September and many posts were left out - a problem experienced every year.
Normally an addendum fixing all the errors is published a few weeks later, but this year the Gauteng department of education (GDE) postponed the appointments of staff until April next year.
This is causing huge problems in schools.
A principal from a school in the south of Johannesburg said he needed six teachers next year and did not know where he would get them from.
"This is causing so much instability in my school," the principal said.
"It means that in January we will have to fill our posts with temporary staff. Then when April comes we will have to ask that staff to leave so that they can be replaced by permanent people. Also a lot of our current staff may leave in April and we won't be able to fill those posts until next year."
He also said schools that needed heads of departments, deputy principals and principals would be left without any senior leadership for four months of the year.
"We are advertising in newspapers at the moment, hoping to draw teachers in, but in the subjects where teachers are scarce like languages, maths and science we don't stand a chance. New teachers go to private schools where there are perks or to schools that can afford school governing body posts - we definitely don't get the cream of the crop. And who is it that suffers in the end? The children, they will be left without teachers."
Another school principal in the East Rand said a letter was sent to schools this week telling them about the four-month delay which she described as "clear as mud".
According to the EDTP-SETA, Gauteng alone is in need of 2 756 maths teachers, 2 372 for technology and 872 for languages.
The principal said she was hiring students with degrees in the subject they will teach in, but don't have teaching diplomas, to fill the gap.
Ronald Nyathi, of the South African Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu), said the GDE's decision to delay posts "is hugely irresponsible and is causing enormous confusion".
Nyathi said the union had been receiving complaints from teachers that they would not be able to meet the deadline to apply for jobs, so they asked for a two-week extension.
"We asked for a two-week extension and they suddenly gave us four months. Does that make any sense? Principals can't plan for next year."
Co-ordinator of teaching experience at the Wits School of Education, Lee Rusznyak, said students were feeling very anxious.
"The students are very stressed and frustrated. Many have applied for government posts but have no idea if they will even get interviews now. They are sitting in limbo waiting."
Rusznyak said some students had temporary posts, but come April will probably have to move to new positions.
"It upsets them, it upsets the schools and it upsets the students," she said.
Spokesperson for the GDE Panyaza Lesufi has denied the claims that classes will be without teachers.
"Every student will have a teacher in front of them next year, let me assure you of that," Lesufi said.
He said when the gazette was released earlier this year they had an enormous amount of complaints and disputes which they have to solve before they can appoint teachers.
"People complained of favouritism, they complained that they were told of posts too late.
"Unfortunately, we had to solve those complaints and because December and January are not viable months for governing bodies, we had to instruct that interviews be done in February, notification given in March and new appointments made in April.
"It's an unfortunate situation, but something that we cannot help. Children will just be in bigger classes for three months."
- This article was originally published on page 2 of The Pretoria News on November 13, 2008
Pretoria
