National Senior Certificate results- A closer look

Recently, the Department of Education released a report on the National Senior Certificate Examination results of 2009. Two days ago thousands of matric students sat down for the first of their final exam papers ready to become part of the 2010 statistics with everyone hoping for better performance across the board this year.

The department’s report, interesting and filled with statistics as it is, leaves us with more questions than answers. After studying the results, all I know is the order in which our provinces performed, and this was published earlier this year already, with the Western Cape coming out ahead of the rest and Mpumalanga being last on the list.

Province                          Pass Rate

Western Cape                                        75%

Gauteng                                                 72%

Free State                                              69%

North West                                            68%

Northern Cape                                        61%

Kwa-Zulu Natal                                     61%

Eastern Cape                                         51%

Limpopo                                                49%

Mpumalanga                                          48%

Nowhere do they unpack the quality of the passes. And that is what really matters.

Using this information the Sunday Times published a list of SA's "Top performing schools" in last Sunday’s paper. These are the schools with 100% to 97% pass rate. No distinction was made about how the pass rate was obtained. , those with lower, standard and higher grade students who excelled and those who met the minimum pass mark. The figures in the report have focus on Quintiles rather than performance. 

We have to encourage excellence in our schools and should no longer compare a school A’s 100% pass rate achieved because the school’s  21 students all passed with the minimum requirements with school B’s result of 99% where 1 of the 97 students failed but 88 received  no less than two distinctions.  In the numbers game School A has a 100% pass rate while school B has a 99% pass rate. Here the numbers do not count.

We need to focus on the quality of our education and measure this accordingly. Our high school graduates should be congratulated not only for passing but rather for passing well. Acknowledge the schools that do well in terms of quality passes and offer encouragement and support to those who are struggling to achieve more than the minimum.

Look deeper into the numbers and read between the lines. 

Report available [O]:

www.timeslive.co.za/matric2010/article724205.ece/Schools-Report