Date: 23/09/2005
Source: Mpumalanga Provincial Government
Title: Masango: Mpumalanga Teaching Awards
Address by Mpumalanga MEC for Education, Siphosezwe Masango, on the occasion of the Provincial Teaching Awards, Aventura Badplaas
Programme Director
Honourable Mayor of Chief Albert Luthuli
Municipality – Cllr Dan Shongwe
Acting HOD – Mr CM Mashaba
Councillors
Colleagues in the Department
Educator Unions
Circuit Managers
School Principals
SGB Members
Adjudicators
Finalists in the various categories
Distinguished Guests
Ladies and Gentlemen
We are on course to educate the nation!
With the advent of the first democratic elections in 1994, the Mpumalanga Department of Education, has since its inception been vigorously fighting to improve the state of education in the province.
Ladies and Gentlemen, a number of challenges that were inherited from the previous regime have been successfully addressed. Some of the achievements made over the past eleven years could not have been realised without the selfless contributions made by our unsung heroes and heroines – the educators.
It is therefore with a great sense of excitement that I join you this evening at such an auspicious occasion where deserving educators will receive awards and be rewarded for their ongoing contribution to the ultimate provisioning of quality education to all.
History has told us how education was used by the previous apartheid regime to ensure a continued superiority and domination over black people. As we celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Freedom Charter, let us increasingly open the doors of learning and culture to all – thereby using education to further entrench freedom and democracy in the country.
Our educators are and will always remain indispensable in the solidification of our democracy. Our freedom and democracy will remain hollow and meaningless in the absence of a dedicated and motivated educator cadreship. It is therefore imperative that the quality of our freedom has to prevail side by side with the quality of our education system.
Classrooms have to be transformed into battle terrains to ensure that the political triumph made eleven years ago, bears fruit for all South Africans. Educators therefore find themselves catapulted into infantry battalions that will decisively strategize and fight this battle with fortitude and immeasurable discipline.
The National Teaching Awards, which was launched in the year 2000, is now entering its sixth year. To refresh our memories, the objectives of the Awards were and still are to:
* Focus public attention on the positive aspects of education, thereby raising the public image of the teaching profession.
* Recognise and promote excellence in teacher performance.
* Honour dedicated, creative and effective teachers and schools.
* Encourage best practices in schools.
* Afford South Africans the opportunity to publicly say thank you to outstanding teams or individual teachers in schools.
The National Teaching Awards are but one of the ways in which the Department of Education acknowledges and encourages dedicated and caring teachers in their efforts to develop each learner into a responsible citizen on a democratic, non-racial and non-sexist South Africa.
In the Policy and Budget Speech I presented to the Legislature on 29 June 2004, I said: “As we journey from the First Decade of Freedom into the Second Decade of Freedom, it is our considered imperative that our education must deliver a new learner cadre and a new intelligentsia, truly moulded and baptised in our revolutionary ideas.
This has to happen and must happen, because South Africa and Africa have to produce a truly patriotic intelligentsia which will be the unapologetic disciple, adherent and proponent of the African Renaissance and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD)”.
Internationally, ladies and gentlemen, there is no schooling system that can successfully achieve any of its constitutional mandates without dedicated and committed teachers. Therefore, dedication and commitment, should not just be perceived as a passing cloud. It is a painstaking effort that must be sustained throughout.
Programme Director, I am soundly appreciative of the outstanding excellence and achievements of the finalists who are part of this occasion this evening. Their achievement is indicative of our deliberate and collective endeavours to continuously improve learner performance in our schools.
I know that tonight’s achievers have benchmarked themselves at a level of distinction that will be a source of hope and inspiration to all educators in the province. Your success is not only making yourselves and your individual schools proud but the whole province as well.
I am proud because your outstanding achievements underline the significance of the noble ethics of hard work that I strongly believe in.
The fact that the Teaching Awards serve as an appropriate conduit for providing the much needed inspiration and motivation to educators, is indeed encouraging.
The educator cadres who will be receiving awards today and who will subsequently represent the province at the National Teaching Awards, later this year, deserve a resounding applause. Go out there, compete and do not come back empty handed.
Programme Director, a word of appreciation goes to educator unions (SAOU, SADTU, NAPTOSA) parent formations (FEDSAS, NASGB), SACE and the adjudicators (Prof. Minnele, Dr Lubisi, Dr Mashile, and Mr Mdluli) for the tireless efforts towards the success of tonight’s occasion. May I address my closing remarks to the finalists for whom this occasion has been organised and give you all my sincerest congratulations on successfully making it through the regional eliminations. This is indeed a proud moment which is a culmination of many months or years of hard work and perseverance.
I wish you happiness and fulfilment in your career. The reality to better the lives of our people through education has long dawned and it is a challenge which all our educators must live up to.
Ayihlome Ifunde!
Issued by: Department of Education, Mpumalanga Provincial Government
23 September 2005
Source: Mpumalanga Provincial Government
Title: Masango: Mpumalanga Teaching Awards
Address by Mpumalanga MEC for Education, Siphosezwe Masango, on the occasion of the Provincial Teaching Awards, Aventura Badplaas
Programme Director
Honourable Mayor of Chief Albert Luthuli
Municipality – Cllr Dan Shongwe
Acting HOD – Mr CM Mashaba
Councillors
Colleagues in the Department
Educator Unions
Circuit Managers
School Principals
SGB Members
Adjudicators
Finalists in the various categories
Distinguished Guests
Ladies and Gentlemen
We are on course to educate the nation!
With the advent of the first democratic elections in 1994, the Mpumalanga Department of Education, has since its inception been vigorously fighting to improve the state of education in the province.
Ladies and Gentlemen, a number of challenges that were inherited from the previous regime have been successfully addressed. Some of the achievements made over the past eleven years could not have been realised without the selfless contributions made by our unsung heroes and heroines – the educators.
It is therefore with a great sense of excitement that I join you this evening at such an auspicious occasion where deserving educators will receive awards and be rewarded for their ongoing contribution to the ultimate provisioning of quality education to all.
History has told us how education was used by the previous apartheid regime to ensure a continued superiority and domination over black people. As we celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Freedom Charter, let us increasingly open the doors of learning and culture to all – thereby using education to further entrench freedom and democracy in the country.
Our educators are and will always remain indispensable in the solidification of our democracy. Our freedom and democracy will remain hollow and meaningless in the absence of a dedicated and motivated educator cadreship. It is therefore imperative that the quality of our freedom has to prevail side by side with the quality of our education system.
Classrooms have to be transformed into battle terrains to ensure that the political triumph made eleven years ago, bears fruit for all South Africans. Educators therefore find themselves catapulted into infantry battalions that will decisively strategize and fight this battle with fortitude and immeasurable discipline.
The National Teaching Awards, which was launched in the year 2000, is now entering its sixth year. To refresh our memories, the objectives of the Awards were and still are to:
* Focus public attention on the positive aspects of education, thereby raising the public image of the teaching profession.
* Recognise and promote excellence in teacher performance.
* Honour dedicated, creative and effective teachers and schools.
* Encourage best practices in schools.
* Afford South Africans the opportunity to publicly say thank you to outstanding teams or individual teachers in schools.
The National Teaching Awards are but one of the ways in which the Department of Education acknowledges and encourages dedicated and caring teachers in their efforts to develop each learner into a responsible citizen on a democratic, non-racial and non-sexist South Africa.
In the Policy and Budget Speech I presented to the Legislature on 29 June 2004, I said: “As we journey from the First Decade of Freedom into the Second Decade of Freedom, it is our considered imperative that our education must deliver a new learner cadre and a new intelligentsia, truly moulded and baptised in our revolutionary ideas.
This has to happen and must happen, because South Africa and Africa have to produce a truly patriotic intelligentsia which will be the unapologetic disciple, adherent and proponent of the African Renaissance and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD)”.
Internationally, ladies and gentlemen, there is no schooling system that can successfully achieve any of its constitutional mandates without dedicated and committed teachers. Therefore, dedication and commitment, should not just be perceived as a passing cloud. It is a painstaking effort that must be sustained throughout.
Programme Director, I am soundly appreciative of the outstanding excellence and achievements of the finalists who are part of this occasion this evening. Their achievement is indicative of our deliberate and collective endeavours to continuously improve learner performance in our schools.
I know that tonight’s achievers have benchmarked themselves at a level of distinction that will be a source of hope and inspiration to all educators in the province. Your success is not only making yourselves and your individual schools proud but the whole province as well.
I am proud because your outstanding achievements underline the significance of the noble ethics of hard work that I strongly believe in.
The fact that the Teaching Awards serve as an appropriate conduit for providing the much needed inspiration and motivation to educators, is indeed encouraging.
The educator cadres who will be receiving awards today and who will subsequently represent the province at the National Teaching Awards, later this year, deserve a resounding applause. Go out there, compete and do not come back empty handed.
Programme Director, a word of appreciation goes to educator unions (SAOU, SADTU, NAPTOSA) parent formations (FEDSAS, NASGB), SACE and the adjudicators (Prof. Minnele, Dr Lubisi, Dr Mashile, and Mr Mdluli) for the tireless efforts towards the success of tonight’s occasion. May I address my closing remarks to the finalists for whom this occasion has been organised and give you all my sincerest congratulations on successfully making it through the regional eliminations. This is indeed a proud moment which is a culmination of many months or years of hard work and perseverance.
I wish you happiness and fulfilment in your career. The reality to better the lives of our people through education has long dawned and it is a challenge which all our educators must live up to.
Ayihlome Ifunde!
Issued by: Department of Education, Mpumalanga Provincial Government
23 September 2005
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