Symposium debates concerns about private and collaboration schooling
PRIVATIZE: Dr Christiaan van der Merwe, Chief executive of Curro Holding Ltd, argues in favour of private schooling during the Public-Private Schooling Symposium on the Mowbray Campus
Wednesday, 26 April 2017
CPUT's Centre for International Teacher Education (CITE) recently hosted a Public-Private Schooling Symposium where academics debated their views on different schooling systems as well as the benefits and concerns of collaboration schooling.
CITE Director, Prof Yusuf Sayed, said the public-private schooling debate has thus far raised more heat than light and that he hoped the symposium will add light to the debate.
Sayed argued that the answer to the provision of quality education lies with the restructuring of public education.
Dr Christiaan van der Merwe, Chief Executive Officer of Curro Holding Ltd, said great leadership and management, ethos and partnerships as well as accountability and transparency are some of the characteristics of successful schools.
Van der Merwe said that over the last 20 years education has generally improved across all schools.
"Every school should allow a child to be what they want and what they can be," he added.
Dr David Harrison, head of the DG Murray Trust, said distribution of quality education in schools has not changed in the last 20 years.
Harrison added that system-wide improvement is not enough on its own as it widens disparities between successful and underperforming schools.
He called for the strengthening of the existing capacity of public schools and district leadership in underperforming schools.
"Place underperforming public schools under new management."
He also called for the introduction of low fee private schools.
*The following universities collaborated in the organization of the symposium: CPUT, University of Cape Town, University of the Western Cape, Rhodes University and Fort Hare University.
Written by Kwanele Butana
Email: butanak@cput.ac.za
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