FREE DAILY EMAIL

Date : 19/04/2004
Source: Ministry of Education
Title: K Asmal: Teacher Recruitment Road show


ADDRESS BY PROFESSOR KADER ASMAL, MINISTER OF EDUCATION, AT THE TEACHER RECRUITMENT ROADSHOW, UNIVERSITY OF THE WITWATERSRAND, 19 April 2004

MEC Jacobs
The Principal of the University of the Witwatersrand
Dean of the Education Faculty, Professor Graham Hall
The Head of the Gauteng Department of Education
Honoured guests
Students, including student teachers
Pupils from surrounding schools in Gauteng.

I welcome all of you to this important event - an event which, like the elections of the past week, will help to give shape to this new country. Last week, I was persuading people to vote for a particular political party - a party which seems to have won the support of many people. Today, I re-assume the role of Minister of Education to try and persuade you, and many other young people like yourselves, to make another important decision - the decision to take up teaching as a career.

Our goal as the Ministry of Education is to make teaching a first choice career. It should never be the last choice that so many of our present teachers faced. I myself became a teacher because my parents could not afford to send me to university. Fortunately for the county, many of these people have done a wonderful job of teaching, and many, like myself, have come to love it over the years. But to be a last choice career is not a healthy thing. Teaching must be a profession which attracts to it the brightest and best of our youth - dedicated people who want to share their own knowledge and experience with children in the classroom. We need pupils who are good at maths and science, at technology and computers, but we also want better teachers of language, history, art and culture, all of which are essential for our full development as a nation.

We are mounting this teacher recruitment roadshow for a number of reasons. One is that we are, by all accounts, likely to face a shortage of qualified teachers in the near future. The HSRC estimates that by 2006 we will need an additional 10 000 teachers each year, in addition to the 5 000 or so that we currently train. Part of this shortage is a consequence of HIV and AIDS, but other factors have contributed to an ageing teaching force, which desperately needs new recruits. Following a long period of rationalization in which jobs were reserved for temporary teachers already in the system, we have at last moved to a position where we are employing new recruits. In future, there will be jobs for well-qualified teachers.

The other reason is that we have introduced, in the new curriculum, a range of new subjects, including technology, and now mathematics literacy. These subjects need a new kind of teacher, open to the range of possibilities which these new disciplines bring. But we also want teachers who are willing to take these ideas and subjects into the poorest parts of our country - the rural areas and townships, where some of our current teachers are unwilling to serve. Despite the hardships associated with many of these posts, there are remarkable rewards as well, as the school and the community embrace the new breed of willing and able teachers. And any teacher will confirm that the support of the parents is probably the most important factor in determining the quality of the post.

You will be glad to know that we are also intending to introduce a salary incentive package for teachers who work in difficult circumstances, especially in the smaller rural schools that still serve many of our children. Many of these are one-person schools, where the teacher works with up to five grades at a time - an extraordinary job that deserves all our respect, and some financial benefit as well!

We are not just targeting youngsters in this recruitment drive. We are aware that there are many people already in jobs who might be interested in a career change, who are willing to take up the challenges posed by teaching. Some people have taken early retirement, but still have an enormous amount to offer the nation. We will welcome all such people, who bring with them their valuable experience of the world of work, and the applied knowledge which this entails. In many of these cases, a one-year postgraduate certificate can be enough to qualify and register as a teacher.

Our contribution to resolving the anticipated teacher shortage has been to improve the conditions of service of teachers, and to ensure they are properly rewarded for the difficult and responsible work that they do. I am pleased to say that although teachers are not paid all they are worth (we could never afford that much!), we have been able to secure salary packages which are genuinely attractive, and more than sufficient to live on. Teachers who have trained for four years start at R85 000 per year - some R7 000 per month, which is far more than the salary of most South Africans. By the time you are head of a high school, you can earn from R150 000 to over R210 000 per year.

These salaries are the result of a new career structure for teachers, one which is extremely attractive, and has been very well received by teachers. It allows a teacher to get promoted while staying in the classroom, doing the job they love and are trained to do - teaching children. At the same time, we have introduced a performance-related salary system, so that teachers who do well and work hard get additional salary increases.

We are also aiming to increase the opportunities available to teachers for further development. Since 1998 we have trained more than 50 000 unqualified teachers, who now have a professional diploma, and permanent positions. A National Framework for Teacher Education, which will soon be released, will propose a system of "professional development points", which will act as a practical incentive for ongoing professional training and development.

Government can only do so much. A huge part of changing the image of teaching is in the hands of the teachers themselves - how they conduct and project themselves in the community. Some teachers have not been helpful in this regard, and have acted to badly discredit the profession. We have been able to act decisively in rooting these out of the profession. However many other teachers, in their own classrooms, have been known to bad-mouth the profession, which also gives a very bad impression to their learners. This all has to change if we are to succeed in our recruitment task.

Fortunately, we have the support and co-operation of the teacher unions, which are represented here today, and by the South African Council for Educators (SACE), whose statutory task is to promote the image of the profession. Working with these partners, we are confident about changing the image of teaching, and restoring it as an honourable and respected job.

So many of our most respected leaders have been trained as teachers, and most of them began their political careers while in classrooms around the country. We must follow their lead, and recognise the value of teachers and teaching in establishing the values and principles of our society. Children are the building blocks of our future, and teachers are the architects and builders who put these blocks in the right place, and facing the right way. If competent teachers do their job well, we will have very few social problems to deal with in the future.

Some of you may have had experiences at school that have put you off teaching. Teachers who were not committed, who were not interested in your progress, and perhaps rude or derogatory, may have convinced you that teaching was not for you. If that is the case, I am sorry. But do not let one experience determine your future. Think about the enormous influence which you could have in society as a teacher. Think about the difference you could make in the lives of thousands of children, as you help them to understand the world, and find out about themselves. Imagine yourself as a key part of creating this new country, of developing the human resources which we need for our social end economic development. Of being able to stand tall, and declare for all to know: I am proud to be a teacher!

Finances should never prevent anyone from becoming a teacher. We have been fortunate to be able to provide loans to people who want to become teachers. The National Student Financial Aid Scheme, the NSFAS, sets aside each year an increasing amount especially for those studying to become teachers, and we want you to make use of this money. Some provinces will also provide you with a bursary to cover the full costs of your study, on condition that you work for them for an equivalent period. The ETDP SETA also has learnerships available for those who want to study while working at a school, and in these you will even be paid a stipend while in training.

All this information is available in a Flyer we have produced to help you think about why you should become a teacher and how to become a teacher. Take one of these - if not for you then for a friend.

I am not here to coerce anyone into teaching. It is a special job, which requires particular qualities. Not everyone has these, and we should not mislead anyone. We do not want people in our classrooms who do not want to be there, and do not have a positive outlook on life. However I do ask you to think very seriously about what you are studying, and why. Ask whether you are preparing yourself in a way which will enable you to make a serious contribution to the building of our nation. If you are unsure about your future, or if you feel dissatisfied with what you are presently doing, contact one of the addresses on the Flyer, and find out what awaits you as a teacher.

I look forward to seeing many of you in a classroom at some stage in the future, and I thank you for your attendance here today.

Issued by: Ministry of Education
19 April 2004

SPONSORED BY

Advanced