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INLSA<\/p>\n
The stories from around the country involving damaged and or dumped textbooks and workbooks are particularly concerning when the state of the countrys education system is taken into account. Photo: Sandile Ndlovu<\/p>\n
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The discovery of workbooks being shredded in KwaZulu-Natal is scandalous \u2013 especially in a country that needs good learning materials in its schools. It raises questions about what exactly happened, whether there was any wrongdoing and, if so, by whom. <\/p>\n
The companies responsible said only 100 rain-damaged books were involved, and denied that \u201cany schools had been adversely affected by the incident\u201d. The episode brought back to the surface questions about their links with the Basic Education director general, Bobby Subrayan, who is under investigation and has been placed on special leave. <\/p>\n
One difficulty is that sexier conspiracy theories of high-level corruption are much more attractive than what may be more mundane explanations that emerge later from an inquiry. They also tend to cloud understanding of underlying systemic issues, tensions and conflicts. <\/p>\n
In Limpopo, for example, part of the problem was irresponsible behaviour on the part of individual employees. One case revealed that under the guise of delivering workbooks to a school, a district employee had gone visiting a girlfriend, clocking up many kilometres. When the storm about non-delivery provoked by Section 27 broke in the media, he panicked and dumped the workbooks in a river, afraid to be found out. His acts are worthy of a Zapiro cartoon, and are laughable had they not harmed pupils. <\/p>\n
But corruption also featured in Limpopo. In question was the over-priced contract between the provincial government and Edusolutions. When Limpopo was placed under national administration, the contract for delivering textbooks at R565 million was investigated and subsequently withdrawn. <\/p>\n
A case brought against the national department to have the contract reinstated was dismissed with costs. Textbooks were eventually bought for R125 million, effecting a major saving in a province heading for a budgetary shortfall of R2 billion and on the verge of being unable to pay teacher salaries. <\/p>\n
In the KZN case, however, the issue was not delivery of textbooks, for which Edusolutions is responsible. It was workbooks, the national department\u2019s flagship project. To understand this issue, we need to distinguish between textbooks and workbooks and how the system of distribution for the two differs. <\/p>\n
Workbooks were introduced in part as a national project to circumvent difficulties encountered in the multiple provincial arrangements to deliver textbooks. It was a direct response to the ongoing and troubling evidence of poor literacy and numeracy in primary schools. <\/p>\n
The idea was to develop colourful workbooks that children could write in and take home. They were to be an additional resource for schools, not displacing, but supplementing textbooks. They were to be delivered directly by the national department rather than through often-unpredictable provincial arrangements. <\/p>\n
In 2010 the Treasury allocated R750 million (reaching R1 billion over five years) for development and delivery of workbooks in languages, maths and life skills. A team under the leadership of Veronica McKay from Unisa and John Aitchison from UKZN produced these workbooks at R13 each, including delivery \u2013 compared with workbooks produced and sold commercially for between R60 and R90. <\/p>\n
The savings were ploughed back into developing workbooks for additional grades and subjects. Delivery was through one contracting agent. <\/p>\n
How textbooks, by contrast, are delivered to schools depends on whether they are section 21 or section 20 schools. Section 21 schools \u2013 mainly suburban schools \u2013 have the right to buy their own textbooks from their provincial allocations. Section 20 schools comprise the majority of schools in townships and rural areas. They do not have the right to buy their own textbooks. Provinces buy and deliver textbooks for them either directly or through third parties. <\/p>\n
KZN, Gauteng and Mpumalanga use Edusolutions, while the Eastern Cape has chosen the East London Credit Bureau and\/or a variety of SMMEs. Publishers normally offer discounts to provinces and third parties. This discount is usually taken as profit or returned to provincial learning and teaching support material budgets. Publishers have alleged that where Edusolutions delivers textbooks, it charges provinces an additional fee. <\/p>\n
The high price of textbooks has long been an issue and the workbook project aimed to do things more cost-effectively. Provinces spend between 4.5 percent and 8 percent of their total budgets on textbooks. Those who spend more, such as Gauteng and the Western Cape, generally deliver and perform better. Mostly, provinces spend 80 percent of their budgets on teachers\u2019 salaries and 20 percent on infrastructure, textbooks and so on. For provinces like Limpopo and the Eastern Cape that spend more than 90 percent of their budgets on teachers\u2019 salaries, and have major infrastructure backlogs, there is always pressure on the textbook budget. <\/p>\n
In the fight to assist provinces to produce and deliver textbooks more cost-effectively, the national department also entered into an agreement at no cost to the department, with the Shuttleworth Foundation to develop maths and science textbooks. <\/p>\n
Despite its goals to address literacy and numeracy and do things more cost-effectively and efficiently, these national initiatives, and the workbook project in particular, have been dogged with controversy. The first salvo was fired by a weekly newspaper, which queried the relationship between the contracting company and the DG. <\/p>\n
The Auditor-General investigated and provided a clean audit, but suspicions have remained and have been taken up by Sadtu (South African Democratic Teachers Union) which has called for his head. <\/p>\n
At first sceptical, academics in the field were won over when they saw the workbooks. But publishers and distributors were dismayed, seeing this as a \u201cwar\u201d on the publishing industry. There is a possibility that provincial-level third party contracting delivery agents were also angry about the workbook contract. <\/p>\n
Those publishers who are in the textbook market had a hard time with OBE (outcomes-based education) which was a disaster for the publishing industry. Schools in the 1990s picked up the erroneous message that textbooks were no longer to be used. At that time, publishers were obliged to market their textbooks to schools. Provinces only gradually put in place mechanisms for buying textbooks. Many publishers lost staff and revenue in the process and went out of business. <\/p>\n
The renewed emphasis on the use of textbooks from the early 2000s and more recently, have expanded the market and made it more secure for publishers. There have also been greater national efforts to ensure that better quality textbooks make their way into schools. An extensive national textbooks selection process ensures that schools are given a choice of eight books per subject. But this national catalogue has also given rise to conflict on the part of those who do not find themselves on the list. Conflict between the state and publishers is thus part and parcel of the effort to ensure better prices and greater use, distribution and quality of textbooks. <\/p>\n
Distribution, or delivery, has been the key issue in South Africa. And as a developing country attempting to redress historical imbalances, there are special problems. The conflict here between larger, established and new distributors and between larger and smaller companies is part of the picture. These conflicts are heightened in a period when the drive and focus is on getting textbooks and workbooks to schools. Once there is a serious failure and fingers are pointed, these conflicts intensify, as do the attempts to cast aspersions on competitors. <\/p>\n
In a period of curriculum stability, the emphasis is likely to shift to textbook retrieval and use. Buying and delivering new textbooks every year is simply unsustainable. <\/p>\n
So, although publishers and distributors probably won\u2019t like it, it will become necessary for schools and teachers to set in place systems to retrieve and re-use textbooks over at least a five-year period, as they do internationally. This will take the pressure off distribution, but also harm the interests of publishers and distributors. <\/p>\n
Conflict is likely to continue. <\/p>\n
Learning and teaching materials are essential in schools and it is critical that provincial and national systems are brought up to speed in this regard. Good quality texts are also important. But ultimately what is vital for teaching and learning at schools is how teachers and pupils use and care for them. <\/p>\n
\u00a0 <\/p>\n
* Linda Chisholm is an adviser to the Minister of Basic Education, Angelina Motshekga.<\/strong> <\/p>\n * The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Newspapers.<\/strong> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" INLSA The stories from around the country involving damaged and or dumped textbooks and workbooks are particularly concerning when the state of the countrys education system is taken into account. Photo: Sandile Ndlovu The discovery of workbooks being shredded in KwaZulu-Natal is scandalous \u2013 especially in a country that needs good learning materials in its […]<\/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-21649","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\/21649","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=21649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21649\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}