Date: 14/10/2003
Source: Department of Education
Title: Asmal: Release of "Education Statistics in South Africa at a Glance in 2001"


SPEECH BY PROFESSOR KADER ASMAL, MP, MINISTER OF EDUCATION, AT THE RELEASE OF "EDUCATION STATISTICS IN SOUTH AFRICA AT A GLANCE IN 2001", Sol Plaatjie House, 123 Schoeman Street, Pretoria, 14 October 2003

Sanibonani, dumelang, good afternoon.

Greetings to you all on this milestone day for education planners, researchers, parents, educators, and learners.

We are meeting today to celebrate the official release of "Education Statistics in South Africa at a Glance in 2001".

The "Education Statistics in South Africa at a Glance" publication was issued for the first time in 1999 with the intention of informing education planning, evaluating the education system's performance and monitoring its progress in providing education and redressing past inequalities.

Following the official release of Census 2001, it is my pleasure to release the 2001 education statistics, which will go a long way in completing the total picture of the state of education in South Africa in 2001. A question that may arise is why the release of education statistics when only recently Census 2001 was released? Census collects general information about the household and not detailed information about the education system. "Education Statistics at a Glance" collects information on teachers, educators, non-educator personnel, learners, their age, grades and home language and other important information about the education and training system. It collects all this detailed information across institutions, in schools, colleges, adult education centres and institutions of higher learning. It is thus a comprehensive picture of the system at a point in time.

A second question that may be asked is why a picture of the system in 2001 being released in 2003? The collection of educational statistics is a mammoth undertaking, to give you but an example of information collection in the schooling system; a 32-page questionnaire is designed after consultation with the nine provincial education departments, teacher unions and organisations whose speciality is education statistics. The master form is then sent to provinces who add their own questions and then print a questionnaire that is more than 32 pages for completion by 28 000 institutions across the country. Questionnaires are sent to district offices who provide guidance, assistance and training to schools for its completion. The questionnaire is normally completed on the third Tuesday of March each year. The schools complete the form by checking school records and then submit the questionnaires to districts for verification and then the process of data capturing begins. Capturing is done by each of the nine provinces within their financial, human resource and physical constraints.

Provincial information is then sent to the Department of Education for consolidation with data from other provinces, and other sub-systems. After consolidation the information is analysed and published. The entire process takes two years, and, for a manual process, this is within international standards for the size of the system as ours. Some countries take up to four years to complete the entire process. I must also emphasise that we do have 2002 information that we are currently using for our management and planning purposes. Whilst this has an immediate benefit in terms of measuring the progress we have made from 1994 to 2001, this data will continue to be of benefit for system planning for future in the years to come. The challenge for us clearly, is to harness the power of information technology to provide more timely data and information. As we find fiscal space we will begin to ensure that we move in this direction.

The "Education Statistics in South Africa at a Glance in 2001" publication is the third report on education statistics released by the Department of Education since 1999. The Department of Education is committed to making education statistics more accessible to the public. This will contribute towards improving the performance of the system and will give the public the opportunity to measure progress made in transforming the education system.

The publication serves the purpose of disseminating education statistics and indicators to all education role-players. These include local partners and research organisations, as well as our international friends and statutory bodies with whom South Africa has adopted and ratified international treaties and declarations, such as UNESCO. Our education indicators offer a benchmark against which the performance of the education system is measured. This pertains to both local measures and international standards so that our rating as a country can be measured against that of others.

While on the matter of UNESCO, we are very concerned about the collection and use of country data for international comparisons. The danger of comparing education systems across the globe without taking into account context, methodology and sampling frame into account can lead to invalid conclusions. Due to these non-standardised procedures of data collection, comparison becomes spurious. The Southern African Consortium for the Measurement of Education Quality (SAQMEQ) uses a sample-based methodology to measure education performance. For sample-based measurement to be reliable one has to ensure that a credible sampling frame is used. It would be difficult to make comparisons on performance if learners have taken the assessment in their home-language in some countries and in a second language in others and where in some cases private schools are measured against public schools. In South Africa for example if one only uses sub-urban schools, the results will be biased against other countries with schools in lower socio-economic communities. It is undesirable to use biased statistics to make value judgements.

I have the honour of releasing this 'Education Statistics at a Glance in 2001" with confidence and we stand by these figures - at least they are more credible than the information we were able to glean from pre-1994. I must also tell you that in government it's quite difficult to please some of our colleagues especially the standards that are being maintained by our National Treasury. Officials from the National Treasury have alluded to the utilisation of this publication as a means to measure and analyse performance.

This is important if we are to assess whether we are making any headway in redressing past inequalities and whether our education system has attained some of the ideals that are key to the broader transformation agenda of our government.

I believe that this comprehensive report will be a source of useful information for learners, educators and parents, as well as for managers, administrators, decision-makers and other important role-players in the education system. The Department of Education has a responsibility to inform role-players within and outside the education community about the basic state of the education system in South Africa. I would like to encourage schools and other educational institutions to use this publication as a research tool for improving classroom practice and for institutionalising knowledge about the South African education system. This publication, together with other publications such as the '2000 School Register of Needs', Annual Reports and the 'Education for All' assessment reports, should provide a fairly complete picture of the performance of the education system.

For the first time this publication includes tables and graphs on the former Technical Colleges as part of the Further Education and Training (FET) sector. Furthermore, the format of the reporting on universities and technikons has also been improved to distinguish between historically black and historically white institutions. More tables have been included to indicate the trend between 1999 and 2001, and, in the case of the Senior Certificate examination pass rates, between 1994 and 2001. The scope of indicators has also been broadened to cover a more comprehensive analysis of the performance of the system. We will continue improving the report by providing more analysis and coverage of the entire system.

The report indicates that in 2001 the South African education and training system catered for 13 426 914 learners, 415 376 educators and 33 894 institutions. It is interesting to note that during that year approximately 30% of all the people in South Africa were learners in the education and training system. Furthermore, the ordinary public and independent schools catered for 87.4% of all learners. The number of learners in ordinary public and independent schools decreased by 4.7% between 1999 and 2001 and the number of educators decreased by 3.1%, whilst the number of schools remained consistent over the same period.

The public Further Education and Training (FET) sector has, in the past two to three years, undergone a massive transformation. This is indicated by the rapid change in the number of FET institutions, from over 150 to the current 50 that were declared officially last year; by the growth in the number of learners; and by the changes in distribution patterns of the learners within the sector. I am pleased to note that the report shows that, of all public FET learners in 2001, 76% were African and 38% were female and these numbers are steadily growing to represent the demographics of this country without any sort of coercion. It shows further that, between 2000 and 2001, the number of public FET learners increased by 1.9% and the number of educators, by 6.9%.

The number of learners in non-formal skills programmes has expanded quite significantly, showing that colleges are seeking new ways to provide relevant training and skills to their communities. The overall student population of the colleges is now fully representative of the demographics of our country. Steady progress has also been made with respect to the race and gender profile of college staff.

The report indicates that, in 2001, the public higher education sector catered for 665 367 students, namely, 448 868 university students and 216 499 technikon students. Enrolments in these two sectors increased by approximately 18 000 in 2001 through the incorporation of teacher training colleges into various universities and technikons. Universities continued, in 2001, to enrol nearly two thirds of all students in the public higher education system.

The information regarding the public higher education sector indicates that race and gender equity in respect of enrolments has continued to improve. In 2001, 54% of all students at public universities and technikons were female and 61% were African.

The responsiveness of the public higher education sector to national social and economic development priorities also improved in 2001. The sector produced a total of 95 329 graduates and diplomats in 2001, approximately 50% of whom had majored in science, engineering, technology, business and management.

Many present at this release today appreciate the enormous changes that have taken place in education in our country. In my budget speech in Parliament this year, I stated that many of our greatest achievements in Education can be quantified and measured against standards of efficiency and effectiveness, and such measurement is important in ensuring that government remains accountable to its electorate in providing quality education. However, we still have much to do to ensure that every child has equitable access to well-resourced schools, and improved quality of teaching and learning.

I would like to record my appreciation to the Director-General and to all the officials who have worked tirelessly to produce this publication, given the challenges that face us in the collection of information from almost 34 000 institutions. There are enormous challenges that the Department is facing, both at national and at provincial level, in collecting data and in ensuring that the quality of the data is improved. Early this year, we implemented a system that would assist us in improving the turn-around time of data collection and processing. I hope that we will soon be able to publish information in the year to which that information refers. I urge my provincial colleagues here to commit more resources to the improvement of our management information systems.

I am about to publish the Education Information Policy for public comment. This is our commitment to the improvement of the quality of information within the system. Through this policy, ladies and gentlemen, we will develop a set of minimum national standards and guidelines for information management and reporting. Standardisation of information standards and definitions will encourage comparability of data within and across provinces and internationally. I hope that you will have an opportunity to look at the draft policy and you will be able to make meaningful comments to help us finalise this policy.

I would like to express my sincere appreciation to SIDA, who have assisted us in the development of EMIS since 1995, this publication would not have been possible without that support.

I therefore take great pleasure in releasing this publication as indicative of the state of education in 2001.

Thank you,
Ke a leboga,
Dankie,
Ngiyabonga.

Issued by the Department of Education, 14 October 2003