Cape Town - With an increase in student numbers projected over the next five years, the cut of over 2000 teachers posts is expected to reverse gains made in reducing the learner-teacher ratio in the Western Cape.
Yesterday, Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Basic Education was briefed by the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) on budget cuts and post declarations.
The engagement also included a briefing by the Northern Cape Department of Education, following oversight visits conducted in both provinces.
On the budget shortfall for the 2024 basket of posts, WCED Head of Department Brent Walters said 64% (R5.4 billion) of the department’s R8.4 bn recorded pressure of the Compensation of Employee shortfall was funded by the National Treasury.
“So to mitigate that, we also just did non-personnel sacrifices to absorb some of the budget baseline. We topsliced 10% in Programme 1. We had a programme called School of Choice, we are not continuing that; we are only doing it with the current cohort. We’ve delayed the provincial equitable share portion of infrastructure because we do spend as a PED (provincial education department) some of our own money on infrastructure. And the Back on Track (BoT) learning losses programme, we also cut that programme. And obviously, we’ve also done additional general programme reprioritisation.”
While cuts made by the department to its budget amounted to R2.5 bn, a R3.8 bn funding shortfall over the next three years still exists.
Since 2016, the department has increased the basket of posts; however, due to not being able to meet its budget, this basket was reduced by 2 407 posts in order to make the budget balance, Walters said.
“What this will mean is that we are taking our learner-teacher ratios back to what it was probably in the Covid-19 period... We actually went backwards now with doing that because over time, we tried to get that ratio down.”
Since 2020, the ratio has faced a steady decline from 01:37.4 in 2020 to the current 01:34.2.
The reduction in teacher posts would mean that this would now be projected to increase to 01:36.7 for the year 2025.
“We did not consider cuts to our frontline educational services, we can’t cut school feeding, we can’t cut learner transport, we can’t cut Norms and Standards school funding because those they use for transfer to schools and use for daily expenses; we can’t cut school furniture and we can’t cut textbook supply.”
In the department’s head office and district offices, staff appointments have been frozen, with a current vacancy rate of 21%.
Over the next five years, the Grade R-12 learner growth is forecasted to increase by 47 673 at Western Cape public ordinary schools.
Next year, 150 schools will have a learner-teacher ratio of over 40, an increase from 66 schools in 2024.
Efforts to reduce the learner-teacher ratio should be intensified, particularly in schools with large class sizes, the committee heard.
A number of committee members raised the issue of the existence and prevalence of racism within schools; exclusionary language policies; and the distribution of resources disproportionately affecting “township schools” or schools with a majority of black learners.
Committee chairperson Khomotjo Joy Maimela said: “We should have a proactive approach where we deliberately create a means that everybody has access to public schools, and we must be deliberate about that.”
Cape Argus