Schools latest: October holidays WILL go ahead, Motshekga confirms

Fear not, students and parents – the October school holidays WILL go ahead as scheduled, contrary to speculation that the Department of Basic Education had resolved to forfeit the time away from the classroom to make up for time lost during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Education Minister Angie Motshekga said during a briefing on Sunday 29 August that while a strategy to reclaim the substantial time school’s have been forced to close remains critical, the October holiday – and the entire school schedule – should continue as planned. 

October school holidays to go ahead as planned  

Motshekga confirmed that the Council of Education Ministers (CEM) had resolved to recommend that the lost number of school days should be recovered at District and school-level, but with only if the circumstances are “reasonable” and won’t impact the schedule too drastically.

“ CEM agreed that the amended 2021 School Calendar MUST be retained as it was from its very last amendment – that the October vacation, will not be interfered with.”

Significant learning lost during COVID-19 pandemic  

During the briefing, Motshekga provided an update on the department’s efforts to stabilise the education sector, and conceded that the pandemic has resulted in dire setbacks that will likely require several years to correct.  

She said that it is vital that government “introduce measures to catch-up on the time as well as the teaching and learning that was lost through the COVID-19 pandemic, in particular”. 

“The first step towards addressing the crisis of lost learning, is to prevent further disruptions to school time, and prevent other learning losses,” she said. 

“We must report that we are extremely concerned about the learning losses observed within the Sector.”

Attendance, intake decline ‘concerning’

Motshekga said that the education sector is faced with challenges that could result in severe setbacks to the prospects of advancing South Africa’s youth 

“Of particular concern, are the learning losses reported across the system, since the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020,” she said. 

Stellenbosch University’s Professor Martin Gustafsson provided concerning insight into the impact that the disruptions have had, saying that a whopping 80% of learning that should have been retained was “lost” in 2020.

“So far, 50% of the 2021 school calendar has been lost for a large number of learners,” he said. 

“Even with the best catch-up programmes, it is now considered near impossible to fully recover from the learning losses.”

Gustafson said that attendance records for students aged between four to six-years-old on 1 Jan is lower in 2021 by around 25 000 pupils, and that first-time intake into grades R and 1 has dropped.

“Children aged seven to 14 is 10,000 lower than it should be. This points to dropping out of compulsory-aged children,” he said.