Minister of Basic Education, the Honourable Angie Motshekga
Colleagues from the education sector in your various categories
Officials of the Department
Staff from Trusts and Foundations which have become very active in the education sector
CSI practitioners
University academics and
Representatives of Teacher Associations
Thank you for finding the time in your busy schedules to attend our AGM.
I am certain that the release of the Annual National Assessment (ANA) results by the Minister this week caused a further surge in the levels of anxiety within the collective gathered here today. That we are facing the challenge boldly and committing to do so in the future should be the silver lining in this dark cloud.
However, the reality is that the road ahead is not going to be an easy one to travel. It is certainly one that should not be travelled in isolation. It requires increased boldness in our actions, much deeper commitment, individually and collectively; openness to new ways of doing things together and individually; an increased measure of humility in terms of how we cooperate around this agenda; and importantly, a sense of urgency.
The most appropriate solutions to the challenge will be those that combine technical and social transformation interventions involving all four sectors of the economy: government, business, labour and the NGOs. Whether there is consensus or not within and among the sectors on how we are moving forward remains a question. Based on our 17 years’ work in school improvement, I make an observation that it is not criticisms that we have been short of in the past years, but tangible proposals on how to move forward.
JET Education Services has elected for itself to focus on collaborating with key players in the four sectors in search for effective and sustainable solutions to the education challenges. Read the entire speech
