Date: 18/03/2005
Source: Western Cape Provincial Government
Title: Dugmore: Grade R start-up kits
Speech by Western Cape MEC for Education, Cameron Dugmore, at Grade R start-up kits - Easter delivery targets, Milnerton
18 March 2005
Thank you very much for the introduction, Mr Dave Sheppard, Acting Chief Director and Director of Institutional Management and Governance Planning, under whose jurisdiction ECD falls
Karen Bydell, Head of ECD Institutions
Other Senior Officials from my Department:
Sindi Shayi, Jenny Rault-Smith
Principal Mr Makhosini Maci
Members of the School Governing Body Teachers and Learners
Distinguished guests
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am very happy that we can hand over the first of 32 Early Childhood Development (ECD) start-up kits for sites in our disadvantaged communities.
I am happy because I am very passionate and committed to see that ECD becomes an important weapon in the struggle against functional illiteracy, and thus poverty.
Last year, after this new Provincial Government was sworn in, the Premier launched a 100-days-delivery campaign. As education we had to complete the building of, and move learners of the Usasazo High School in Maitland, to Khayelitsha.
Secondly, we had to make sure that at least 50 per cent of twelve schools still without electricity must have been electrified. I am proud to say we have delivered on all of this, exceeding our targets.
Similarly, after the Cabinet Lekgotla in January this year, the Premier has instructed us to deliver before the end of April, the following:
* start-up kits for 30 Grade R sites in poor areas
* 80 bursaries for Maths and Science teachers
* sod turning for seven new schools
* 320 high schools to have computer labs.
So, ladies and gentlemen, you can see the President and the Premier are putting huge pressure on us. They are doing this because they are concerned with the abject poverty in which the majority of our population still finds itself in.
In my inaugural Budget Speech last year, I said: Siza kuyitshintsha le Ntshona Koloni! Ons gaan die Wes-Kaap verander! We are going to change the Western Cape!
Premier Ebrahim Rasool put the vision of this Provincial Government clearly, when he said we need to build this province as a Home for All. In order to build this Home for All, we have adopted an economic development strategy - Ikapa Elihlumayo - which means "Growing and Sharing the Cape".
We have some serious challenges in providing the knowledge, skills, values and attitude for iKapa Elihlumayo. As early as 2000, the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) initiated its first diagnostic testing of learners on a small scale. It was later broadened to include all schools across the province in both grades 3 and 6.
We are all more or less familiar with the results, and therefore judging from it, it is clear that ECD must become an increasingly important part of our strategy to build the human resource personnel for Ikapa Elihlumayo.
Currently, we have 45 000 learners in Grade R, with an anticipated increase to 80 000 by 2014. The projected growth of 35 000 learners implies an increase in enrolment at a rate of 3 500 per annum over the next ten years.
In addition to ensuring the availability of Grade R programmes, other critical challenges that need to be addressed, include the general lack of access to services; the poor educational quality of many of the existing services; and the lack of nutritional support.
The challenge of ensuring that the learning outcomes of Grade R National Curriculum Statement are taught and acquired by learners is perhaps the most critical. This reinforces the need for effective educator training and the provision of requisite equipment and readers.
In media reports last year, Daleen Klop, a well-known researcher and speech-language therapist, says she has studied 400 children a year - all from disadvantaged homes in and around Stellenbosch - for five years.
She found that most children "started school with no idea of what a book is, nor any experience of word play or rhyming".
She found that the children arrive at school "with nothing in place to facilitate learning, and to expect any Grade 1 teacher to make up for what has been lacking for six years, is impossible".
Submerged into a curriculum geared for and based on the assumption of ,
Source: Western Cape Provincial Government
Title: Dugmore: Grade R start-up kits
Speech by Western Cape MEC for Education, Cameron Dugmore, at Grade R start-up kits - Easter delivery targets, Milnerton
18 March 2005
Thank you very much for the introduction, Mr Dave Sheppard, Acting Chief Director and Director of Institutional Management and Governance Planning, under whose jurisdiction ECD falls
Karen Bydell, Head of ECD Institutions
Other Senior Officials from my Department:
Sindi Shayi, Jenny Rault-Smith
Principal Mr Makhosini Maci
Members of the School Governing Body Teachers and Learners
Distinguished guests
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am very happy that we can hand over the first of 32 Early Childhood Development (ECD) start-up kits for sites in our disadvantaged communities.
I am happy because I am very passionate and committed to see that ECD becomes an important weapon in the struggle against functional illiteracy, and thus poverty.
Last year, after this new Provincial Government was sworn in, the Premier launched a 100-days-delivery campaign. As education we had to complete the building of, and move learners of the Usasazo High School in Maitland, to Khayelitsha.
Secondly, we had to make sure that at least 50 per cent of twelve schools still without electricity must have been electrified. I am proud to say we have delivered on all of this, exceeding our targets.
Similarly, after the Cabinet Lekgotla in January this year, the Premier has instructed us to deliver before the end of April, the following:
* start-up kits for 30 Grade R sites in poor areas
* 80 bursaries for Maths and Science teachers
* sod turning for seven new schools
* 320 high schools to have computer labs.
So, ladies and gentlemen, you can see the President and the Premier are putting huge pressure on us. They are doing this because they are concerned with the abject poverty in which the majority of our population still finds itself in.
In my inaugural Budget Speech last year, I said: Siza kuyitshintsha le Ntshona Koloni! Ons gaan die Wes-Kaap verander! We are going to change the Western Cape!
Premier Ebrahim Rasool put the vision of this Provincial Government clearly, when he said we need to build this province as a Home for All. In order to build this Home for All, we have adopted an economic development strategy - Ikapa Elihlumayo - which means "Growing and Sharing the Cape".
We have some serious challenges in providing the knowledge, skills, values and attitude for iKapa Elihlumayo. As early as 2000, the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) initiated its first diagnostic testing of learners on a small scale. It was later broadened to include all schools across the province in both grades 3 and 6.
We are all more or less familiar with the results, and therefore judging from it, it is clear that ECD must become an increasingly important part of our strategy to build the human resource personnel for Ikapa Elihlumayo.
Currently, we have 45 000 learners in Grade R, with an anticipated increase to 80 000 by 2014. The projected growth of 35 000 learners implies an increase in enrolment at a rate of 3 500 per annum over the next ten years.
In addition to ensuring the availability of Grade R programmes, other critical challenges that need to be addressed, include the general lack of access to services; the poor educational quality of many of the existing services; and the lack of nutritional support.
The challenge of ensuring that the learning outcomes of Grade R National Curriculum Statement are taught and acquired by learners is perhaps the most critical. This reinforces the need for effective educator training and the provision of requisite equipment and readers.
In media reports last year, Daleen Klop, a well-known researcher and speech-language therapist, says she has studied 400 children a year - all from disadvantaged homes in and around Stellenbosch - for five years.
She found that most children "started school with no idea of what a book is, nor any experience of word play or rhyming".
She found that the children arrive at school "with nothing in place to facilitate learning, and to expect any Grade 1 teacher to make up for what has been lacking for six years, is impossible".
Submerged into a curriculum geared for and based on the assumption of ,
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