Increasing access to education

SoNA 2018

President Cyril Ramaphosa outlined a number of successes with regard to education in his State of the Nation Address.

Achievements in basic and higher education include:

• South Africa has nearly a million children in early childhood development facilities.
• The matric pass rate increased from 60.6 percent in 2009 to 75.1 percent last year.
• There are currently almost a million students enrolled in higher education, up from just over 500 000 in 1994.
• Starting this year, free higher education and training will be available to first year students from households with a gross combined annual income of up to R350 000.
• Government will continue to invest in expanding access to quality basic education and improving the outcomes of public schools.
• The Funza Lushaka Bursary programme plans to award 39 500 bursaries for Initial Teacher Education over the next three years.
• From the beginning of this year, all public schools have begun to offer an African language.
• The Department of Basic Education will also see the implementation of the first National Senior Certificate examination on South African Sign Language, which will be offered to learners at the end of 2018.
• The Accelerated Schools Infrastructure Delivery Initiative programme will continue to build modern facilities to schools in rural and underprivileged urban areas across the country, with about 187 schools being complete to date.  

Did you know?

• Funding for the National Student Financial Aid Scheme increased from R2.4 billion in 2008 to R15 billion in 2017.
• In 2017 over 460 000 students were funded by NSFAS for both university and TVET colleges.
• More than nine million children attend no fee schools, which represents at least 80 percent of our schools.