KZN education officials have ordered high schools that “manipulated” the system to correct their timetables immediately.
|||Durban - KwaZulu-Natal high schools that persisted in allowing their physical science and accounting pupils to substitute pure mathematics with maths literacy have been instructed to correct their timetables immediately.
Such schools were “manipulating” the system and acting in their own interests - either to protect their teachers or their Grade 12 pass rates - said KZN Education Department head Nkosinathi Sishi on Thursday.
Pupils wanting to pursue careers in engineering, medicine or commerce needed to have mastered pure maths to earn their degrees, Sishi explained.
Educationists have repeatedly expressed concern about the dwindling number of pupils who are tackling pure maths.
Whereas pure maths content was abstract and technical, maths literacy taught pupils to read charts and calculate percentages to apply to problems and situations in daily life.
Last year, the department turned down 16 Durban schools who had all asked that at least 10 of their matric pupils drop pure maths in favour of maths literacy.
The maths pass rate in the province was 48 percent, compared to 80 percent for maths literacy.
Nationally, nearly 300 000 matric pupils wrote the maths literacy paper. Just more than 225 000 pupils sat for the pure maths final exam - a decrease from 290 000 in 2009.
On Thursday, Sishi said that staff at certain schools could not teach pure maths and, because these schools did not want these teachers to be declared redundant, they did not give pupils the choice.
He said 65 percent of pupils in the province had opted for maths literacy. “The department is not only interested in lifting its pass rate. If we wanted that, we’d leave pupils to do maths literacy.”
However, more qualified pure maths teachers were needed to do so.
Sishi had a stern word for parents, saying that pupils who struggled with pure maths, but persisted in taking the subject, would need financial support for extra lessons to ensure that they fill the gaps in their knowledge. - The Mercury