Department of Education Extranet

Schooling resumes for Grade 12's

The Northern Cape Department of Education can confirm that it is pleased with the manner in which schools resumed today, specifically for Grade 12 learners, after a week's recess as per the President's announcement. At this stage we can confirm that schooling resumed today with no major challenges reported.  We will however only be able to elaborate on the rate of attendance of educators and learners, once we receive the comprehensive reports from our District offices.

The four (4) week school break is necessary to curb the spread of COVID-19 during a time when our country is nearing the peak of the infections. The education sector in particular remains to be affected by the loss of valuable learning and teaching time due to school closures where positive cases are reported. To date, 112 schools in the Province have been affected, with positive cases being reported. We continue to follow strict protocols in order to comply with the National COVID-19 regulations and guidelines.

All our efforts are geared towards saving the school academic year, without comprising the lives of our educators and learners. We have developed learner support packages for all learners in all Grades, which will soon be distributed to all schools. We are also busy preparing to incubate at least 3000 Grade 12's  for a period of 3 months at different venues across the Province. All the safety precautionary measures will be taken in this regard. This programme is planned to commence with at least 1300 learners and we will gradually phase in the remaining learners. These camps will function as normal schools where teaching, learning and assessments will be prioritised. This will ensure that our Grade 12 learners will be ready for the 2020 National Senior Certificate Examinations. 

We also wish to thank all schooling communities which have contributed significantly towards the protection of the assets of our schools. During the past week only two incidents were reported where schools were broken into. We have reported these incidents to SAPS so that perpetrators can be brought to book and face the full might of the law.

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