Date: 03/10/2003
Source: Mpumalanga Provincial Government
Title: Padayachee: Mpumalanga-Canada Teacher Development Project celebration


KEYNOTE ADDRESS DELIVERED BY THE MPUMALANGA MEC FOR EDUCATION, MR CNM PADAYACHEE, AT THE MPUMALANGA-CANADA TEACHER DEVELOPMENT PROJECT CELEBRATION, Secunda, 3 October 2003

Programme Director
Regional Director: Dr Mathunyane
Project Field Manager: Bill Lockhart
Coordinator Support (Sacha Innes) and partners from Canada
Director-General National Department of Education: Mr Duncan Hindle
Colleagues from National Office
Union Representatives
Canada South Africa Teacher Development
Project (CSATDP)
Project Coordinators from Gauteng and the Free State Department of Education
Head of Department: Dr Mashinini
Departmental Officials
Educators and parents
Invited Guests

It affords me great pleasure to be part of this gathering to mark and celebrate the achievements attained since the beginning of the Canada Teacher Development Project in this Province in 2000.

Mpumalanga Province is very grateful to the Canadian Government for its willingness and commitment to support our young democracy. When our ex-President Dr Nelson Mandela echoed the plight of South Africans with regards to redress just after the 1994 elections, the Canadian Government was one of those countries that answered the call. Hence, this partnership with the Province of Alberta to day. Because the project has to operate in other provinces (Gauteng and Free State) there was a need for the National Department of Education (DOE) to coordinate these activities so that growth processes could be maximised.

Because the project operates at national and in the four provinces, the project had to come up with an overarching goal that would capture activities in the four departments. Befittingly the project goal was conceptualised "to improve the quality of education in South Africa by strengthening educator professional development and support". The project purpose is to support the national DOE to coordinate INSET policies and procedures while strengthening the capacity of provincial departments to plan, implement, manage and maintain a high standard of INSET programming.

The Mpumalanga Province identified Inclusive Education and OBE as the area of focus where INSET capacity building had to be displayed. When the project started, the Inclusive Education Green Paper was in circulation. White Paper 6 was released in July 2001 and the paper defines inclusive education and training as:
* Acknowledging that all children and youth can learn and need support
* Enabling education structures, systems and learning methodologies to meet the needs of all learners
* Acknowledging and respecting differences in learners, irrespective of age, gender, ethnicity, language, class disability, HIV status etc
* Changing attitudes, behaviour, teaching methods, curricula and environment to meet the needs of all learners.

To be in line with the guidelines given in the White Paper 6 definition, the Inclusive Education wing of the project in Mpumalanga is called the "All Learners Learn Project" indicating the depth in the understanding of what inclusive education stands for. One has been briefed that there is another wing of the project that is driven from our head office, which deals with the formulation of the Mpumalanga Professional Development Policy and Dr Sue Lynch (who is present here today) is helping us with this policy. It is going to be very fulfilling to have this policy ratified before the end of the year and more responsibility will be on the implementation of the policy and getting the coordination of INSET right in the province, which is the main aim for the development of the policy.

Let me focus on what the Inclusive Education wing of the project has achieved. Because of minimal resources (a total budget of R1,9 million), the project was conceptualised as a pilot and the Standerton area in Gert Sibande became the target. It then became the responsibility of the province to plan for sustainability. At the time of the conceptualisation of the project, Gert Sibande or Standerton to be precise did not have Curriculum Implementers (CIs) to support educators. This then placed a huge challenge on the project. Just as the project was gearing itself for implementing, the demarcated Inclusive Education staff (who were going to be very key to the implementation) retired and this left a vacuum on human resources that was attached to the department. In spite of these setbacks the project managed to attain its objectives and the successes could be attributed to good leadership, commitment and partnership. I would then like to elaborate on each of these qualities that characterises the project:

All those involved in the project had shown a lot of commitment. The commitment of Circuit Managers, the Ermelo Inclusive Education officials who came in when the project was lacking in the special needs support, the Foundation Phase CIs who worked in partnership with the other members of the team and all the members of the district core training team who has been supporting the educators since the beginning of the project, gave the process some good models for project implementation.

The greatest challenge to the province is the sustainability of what we have started. How will the province manage to support and keep the lessons learnt in the 80 schools that the project is working in at the moment?

Another challenge is the extension of the project to other schools in the circuits that the project is operating in, as not all schools are participating in the project. Coupled with that is the extension of the trained skills to other phases in the same school. The Inclusive Education project was introduced in the Foundation Phase and it stays a challenge to extend these skills to the Intermediate Phase, with the national directive of course.

We shall ensure that circuit teams continue to exist even after the life of the project to help provide support to schools. The Circuit Managers as they are involved in the project will help facilitate this process.

In conclusion, I wish to congratulate all the trainers and educators who will be receiving their certificates here today.

Issued by: Department of Education, Mpumalanga Provincial Government
3 October 2003