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Mbuyiseni Mathonsi, provincial secretary of the SA Democratic Teachers Union<\/p>\n
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Leanne Jansen <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Teachers must fulfil their professional responsibility to quality education and not in a \u201cnarrow and self-interested\u201d way focus solely on labour issues. <\/p>\n
This is the opinion of <\/p>\n
Mbuyiseni Mathonsi, provincial secretary of the SA Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu), the country\u2019s biggest teachers\u2019 untion <\/p>\n
Mathonsi said the mindset had to shift from pre- 1994 politics of protest and \u201ccrude\u201d union demands and principles, towards nation-building. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere has had to be inten- sive teacher development, [coupled with] a paradigm shift, ideologically speaking, to build a particular teacher cadre. <\/em> <\/p>\n \u201cThere are people who joined us because they thought Sadtu was promoting mediocrity. They thought that we were marching for salaries. And, to a particular extent, that\u2019s how we have been known,\u201d Mathonsi said during an interview with The Mercury.<\/em> <\/p>\n \u201cYou still have teachers who have not crossed 1994. The approach of Sadtu since 2008 has been not only as a fighter improving the conditions of workers, which is narrow and self-interested, but also [to encourage]\u2026 taking responsibility for the building of a nation\u2026 Our taking over in 2009, this generation of mine, is faced with the task of being the best of both worlds.\u201d<\/em> <\/p>\n Of KZN\u2019s 89 000 teachers, Sadtu claims 60 000 as members. <\/em> <\/p>\n Of the argument that teacher unionisation had been to the detriment of professionalism, Mathonsi conceded: \u201cThat\u2019s what people think, because to a particular extent it has been true.\u201d<\/em> <\/p>\n \u201cWe are the majority union\u2026 we are a two-thirds majority. So\u2026 if there\u2019s a failure rate\u2026 we must be blamed two thirds of the time.\u201d<\/em> <\/p>\n Referring to initiatives such as winter holiday revision classes for pupils, and teacher subject committees, Mathonsi argued for the importance of the organisation as an education stakeholder. <\/em> <\/p>\n He revealed that Sadtu had requested that the department put school admissions on the back burner \u2013 a matter on which he said the union had not been consulted.<\/em> <\/p>\n The debate about a first come, first served policy led Mathonsi to question why pupils from rural and townships areas should have to attend \u201cfaraway schools\u201d in pursuit of better education.<\/em> <\/p>\n<\/p>\n In the event that a move to integrate pupils materialised, it should be along socio-economic rather than racial lines, Mathonsi said, adding that Sadtu would then suggest children of \u201cdomestic workers, gardeners, tea ladies and security guards\u201d who worked in middle-class suburbs be allowed to attend \u201copulent schools free of charge\u201d.<\/em> <\/p>\n Sadtu has also asked that the rationalisation of schools be halted so that teachers\u2019 unions and governing bodies could have their say. <\/em> <\/p>\n The rationalisation process will involve merging, splitting and closing so-called non-viable schools.<\/em> <\/p>\n At the time of the interview, Mathonsi had just submitted input on a draft amendment to introduce competency tests for matric markers.<\/em> <\/p>\n In short, \u201cit is wrong on all legs. In diagnosis, prescription and conceptualisation. It is wrong left, right and centre, and all around\u201d. \t8<\/strong>P11<\/em> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Mbuyiseni Mathonsi, provincial secretary of the SA Democratic Teachers Union Leanne Jansen Teachers must fulfil their professional responsibility to quality education and not in a \u201cnarrow and self-interested\u201d way focus solely on labour issues. This is the opinion of Mbuyiseni Mathonsi, provincial secretary of the SA Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu), the country\u2019s biggest teachers\u2019 untion […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-14745","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14745\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}