Too many students, not enough spaces

TERTIARY institutions next year can take in only 18,000 out of the 72,000 Grade 12 students who sat their national examinations this month.
What happens to the remaining 50,000-plus is the challenge the relevant authorities must work on to address.
The problem is clear but the solutions are not so easy to come by.
So the obvious question is what is the government doing about it?
What is their strategy and overall plan to deal with the problem?
The education sector had taken on a lot of reforms and the focus was now on quality education.
Education Minister Nick Kuman says the policy on tuition free fee was all about accessibility and the government have achieved that for students from elementary to secondary schools.
But with the build of masses there are bound to be issues that society will face.
The education system in the country has always been on the basis of letting only the best and brightest through.
This pyramid structure of education has seen a large portion of students miss out on continuing their learning experience in formal and state-funded institutions because they could not graduate to the next level as required by the system.
It is not a fair system but it is one that has been in place for practical reasons.
The most obvious reason is to do with the state’s ability to educate all who enter the education system.
Other than the reason of volume beating the state’s capacity, there is the question of cost.
The need for more space in institutions and new schools will
continue to rise over the coming years.
Spacing would not be an issue had a 10-year focus plan been factored prior to the introduction of the policy.
The policy obviously means that more students would enter schools but with no planning whatsoever to build classes and school to accommodate the big increase, and ensure that there are enough teacher.
Teachers don’t just come along.
They need to be recruited and trained, and to train one would take a few years.
The policy is obviously here to stay, hence, now the work around to make it feasible.
While those tasked to plan a way forward in this scenario, the rest of the school-leavers are left to fend for themselves either in the job market or in private education institutions – if they can afford it which is very unfair.
In many, if not most families, there is a high value attached to education.
It is seen as the ticket to a better life and something that can enable not only the recipient of the education but their families and tribes.
The effect is multiplied and magnified over the community.
This has been a problem for a long time – it just was not felt as sharply in the community as it is now.
The number of yearly school drop outs and their place and use in society is a ticking time bomb.
If left unchecked, the large numbers of unemployed youth turned away by the system would become a developmental obstacle for the country.