{"id":22608,"date":"2013-09-13T20:21:46","date_gmt":"2013-09-13T18:21:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/school-norms-already-in-crossfire\/"},"modified":"2013-09-13T20:21:46","modified_gmt":"2013-09-13T18:21:46","slug":"school-norms-already-in-crossfire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/school-norms-already-in-crossfire\/","title":{"rendered":"School norms already in crossfire"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>        \t                                <!-- Main Editorial Image --><br \/>\n                    \t\t\t      \t\t\t                                      <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/plugins\/rss-poster\/cache\/e4999_2812106501.jpg\" alt=\"Copy of nm angiem (36627109)\" title=\"\" class=\"pics\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"captions_credit_article\">GCIS<\/p>\n<p class=\"captions\">Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga. Photo: GCIS<\/p>\n<p class=\"captions\">\n<p class=\"related_articles\">Related Stories<\/p>\n<ul class=\"menu_tab_lists_related\">\n<li><a class=\"related_articles\" href=\"http:\/\/www.iol.co.za:80\/news\/politics\/zille-law-doesn-t-oblige-motshekga-to-set-norms-1.1558259\">Zille: Law doesn\u2019t oblige Motshekga to set norms<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"related_articles\" href=\"http:\/\/www.iol.co.za:80\/news\/crime-courts\/minister-must-publish-school-norms-1.1545563\">Minister must publish school norms<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><!--PSTYLE=WT Web Text--><\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Durban &#8211; Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga released the minimum norms and standards for school infrastructure on Thursday &#8211; and was immediately criticised for imposing a 17-year time frame on implementation. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">The regulations say each school must have some form of electricity, sufficient water and a community or centralised library, and they recommend classroom sizes, among other measures. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Motshega released the regulations after a sustained campaign by the NGO Equal Education, which included court action. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">On Thursday, educationists argued that the implementation of time frames in the revised document did not address the dire infrastructure situation in many schools with the urgency needed. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">The new draft lays out details such as that every Grade R pupil must have at least a 2m\u00b2 piece of classroom space and that each school must be protected by a fence at least 1.8m high. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Motshekga has until the end of November to publish a final version of the regulations, which spell an end to pit toilets and overcrowded classrooms. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">But Basil Manuel, the president of the National Professional Teachers\u2019 Organisation of South Africa, said while he realised that the infrastructure backlogs at schools could not all be fixed \u201covernight\u201d, far more urgency was warranted. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">The regulations give provincial education departments 10 years to provide basics such as electricity, water and sanitation, while the deadline for equipping schools with libraries, laboratories and sport facilities is 2030. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">\u201cWhat these regulations are saying is that there are hundreds of thousands of learners who will never see the inside of a school library or laboratory,\u201d Manuel said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">\u201cAccording to the department\u2019s own reports there are approximately 2 000 schools that do not have water and about 900 that have no toilet facilities. It is unthinkable. We are talking about the basic dignity of learners and educators.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Manuel also called a caveat in the draft regulations, which stated that implementation would take place as far as \u201creasonably practicable\u201d, unacceptable. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Graeme Bloch, a visiting adjunct professor at Wits University\u2019s School of Public and Development Management, agreed that while Motshekga had done well to abide by the court order, the regulation implementation time frames were \u201cnot good enough\u201d. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Bloch added that he believed the regulations should be legally enforceable \u2013 \u201cno ifs or buts about it\u201d. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Equal Education\u2019s deputy general secretary, Doron Isaacs, said while the punctual publication of the draft was welcomed, more time was needed to further scrutinise it before commenting. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">Basic Education Department spokesman Panyaza Lesufi characterised the reaction to the publication of the regulations as positive. He emphasised that the document was a draft, and that the public was being invited to submit comments, which would be considered before a final version was published. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\">KwaZulu-Natal MEC for Education Senzo Mchunu previously told The Mercury that while the government knew what the ideal school should look like, and was working towards that standard, \u201cimpossible expectations\u201d were not going to conjure bigger budgets. <\/p>\n<p class=\"arcticle_text\"><strong>The Mercury<\/strong> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>GCIS Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga. Photo: GCIS Related Stories Zille: Law doesn\u2019t oblige Motshekga to set norms Minister must publish school norms Durban &#8211; Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga released the minimum norms and standards for school infrastructure on Thursday &#8211; and was immediately criticised for imposing a 17-year time frame on implementation. The [&hellip;]<\/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-22608","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\/22608","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=22608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22608\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}