Backlogs in placing children still not enrolled at schools for the current academic year continue, now six weeks since the start of the 2023 school year.
On Friday 3 March, David Maynier, provincial minister for education said in a statement that parents are still applying for school placements.
“When schools opened, we had placed over 50 000 more learners than we had by that date the previous year, thanks to an unprecedented investment in infrastructure aiming to deliver 842 new classrooms (including building a school in 65 days!), and the hard work and planning of our schools, district officials and Head Office,” he told People’s Post.
To combat the continuous influx of children attending schools in the province, the department has undertaken to build 842 classrooms by the end of this month, creating space for 26 000 learners.
To date, 721 of these classrooms have been delivered.
“Over the past five years, the number of learners in the Western Cape has grown by an average of 17 900 learners every year. This growth in the number of learners cannot be accommodated within existing infrastructure, which is why we have had to make such a substantial investment in building and expanding schools and increasing the number of teachers in our schools,” Maynier said.
“Late applications – especially the extremely late applications we are still receiving – will continue to put our system under pressure each year. For example, we have received new, extremely late applications for 4 045 Grade 1 and Grade 8 learners since 1 January 2023 for the 2023 school year, including 926 in the past month.”
As of Friday 24 February, 121 806 – or 99.6% – of the unique Grade 1 and Grade 8 placement applications for the current school year have been resolved and are in the process of placing 487 Grade 1 and Grade 8 learners for the rest of the school year.
“It is important to note that the overwhelming majority of the cases where placement is still in progress are new applicants who arrived this year,” reads the statement.
The best way to avoid this is to apply on time.
Applications fall into three groups:
- Applications received on time before the deadline;
- Late applications received after the deadline but before the end of 2022; and
- Extremely late applications received since the start of this year.
Applications for the 2024 academic year open on Monday 13 March
