Teachers protest as contracts not renewed

Teachers, parents and pupils at Steenberg High School and other schools in the Western Cape have vowed to protest against the Western Cape Education Department’s (WCED) choice of budget cuts.

Last year the national government announced major budget cuts, which forced the department to implement stringent cost containment measures because of a R870 million deficit in the 2024/25 financial year.

The department implemented Circular 34 which led to several contracts of teachers at public schools across the province, which ended on March 29, not being renewed - for several reasons according to the department.

Steenberg High School lost four contract teachers when the term started and released a statement saying that the circular had and will have disastrous effects on the school.

There are fears that the implementation will lead to a Temporary Revised Education Plan (TREP) where pupils rotate school days - like the system that was implemented during Covid-19.

Circular 34 also means that there will be no provision of substitute teachers, except to cover teachers on maternity leave; and employees on long-term incapacity leave exceeding 30 days and more.

The school then organised a protest for Friday April 5 to take a stance against the “injustice that affects the learners” and to voice their discontent with the WCED’s decision.

Parents of a Grade 11 pupil supported the protest on Friday. They were opposed to the WCED’s decision to terminate contracts at the school because it means their son and the rest of the Grade 11 class do not have a Life Orientation teacher.

My son and other pupils will be negatively affected by this, said Roslyn Malan.

“They (WCED) are robbing children of their education because now there will be 70 children in one classroom.

“The teachers already can’t cope with the amount of pupils but now they’re doubling it - it’s too much and they (WCED) are putting more pressure on teachers who already have a heavy workload.”

She said the department should look at other ways of cutting costs instead of cutting teachers at school’s that they know can’t afford to employ School Governing Body (SGB) teachers.

Roderick Malan thinks the department is doing an injustice to all the learners at the schools affected and called for an urgent reversal of their decision.

“It is going to affect our children because learners will not be able to function in a class of over 70. That is a lot to ask of the learners and of the teachers.”

South Peninsula High School principal Zeid Baker also supported the protest and also insisted that the department withdraw the circular.

“There’s no doubt that this is affecting our schools. The well off schools have the necessary resources, our schools do not have the resources. The honourable thing to do would be to put a moratorium on this and allow our children to get a quality education.

“It’s the oppressed communities that’s being affected by this so the sooner they stop this the better. The communities will stand up and put pressure on the government because we are passionate about the education of our children.”

The department is spending R350 million on the Back on Track (BOT) programme, (which assists pupils after the effects of the pandemic), so why not use those funds to ensure that there are teachers in the classroom, said Mr Baker.

Former teacher and union representative Roy Prinsloo said the circular is symptomatic of the bigger picture of budget cuts but this will most likely lead to a failed education system, especially for children from poorer communities. “When we were in the trenches and fighting for education rights during apartheid we said ‘away with gutter education’ but it seems that’s where we are headed. Education is being messed up by the government.”

One of the teachers, who did not want to be named, whose contract ended, lambasted the WCED for their decision.

“The department feels due to the amount of learners at the school I was teaching, that they cannot have two Grade 2 teachers as the budget is not able to compensate another teacher's salary. My fellow Grade 2 teacher will now have to absorb my 37 pupils and the class will function with both English and Afrikaans as a language of instruction with over 70 children… It’s simply inhumane working conditions.

Bronagh Hammond, the WCED’s director of communication, said the effects of Circular 34 on pupils is not ideal, but would be temporary and added the alternative is to cut posts in order to afford the budget deficit on cost of employees: “That is something we would like to avoid.”

Asked about the Temporary Revised Education Plan (TREP), she said the WCED will engage with schools to avoid it as far as possible and she added that no teacher contracts have been terminated but rather that their contracts ended and were not renewed.

“These are contract posts in vacant positions. The school is still able to employ a permanent P1 teacher in the post and we encouraged schools to do so, and to still do so. The post has not been taken away.”

These posts must however be filled with a permanent post. And over 300 contract posts have been converted, with a further 800 being processed for conversion due to late submissions, said Ms Hammond.

In a statement, the department said despite the major budget cuts, they are doing everything they can to support schools, and will continue to fight to deliver quality education to the learners in the Western Cape.

The department said it issued Circular 34 in November last year indicating that in order to maintain the number of permanent teaching posts in the system and stability in schools, various cost containment measures had to be implemented and consulted with school governing body associations, principals’ associations, teachers’ unions and schools, said Ms Hammond.

“We agreed to delay the implementation by one term, to ensure our schools were ready to manage this process and approximately 3 100 contract posts were converted to permanent posts between 1 January 2024 and 31 March 2024.

“Vacancy lists were made available so that schools could ensure that appointments to fill vacant posts could be made before 1 April 2024 and school SGBs were urged to give recruitment processes their urgent attention, and the department made arrangements to expedite the administration around the filling of posts,” said Ms Hammond.

She added many schools took the necessary steps to ensure that they had implemented the measures outlined in the circular by March 31. “The department is stepping in to support the schools that have not implemented the measures. In some instances, unexpected or late resignations of permanent staff have complicated matters.”

Responding to the department’s statement, Mr Baker said principals try to manage the situation where teachers retire and resign and the posts are advertised but it takes long time to fill these posts.

“Some schools wait up to nine or ten months to get teachers employed and parents battle to pay school fees so we cannot appoint SGB teachers because we don’t have the funds for it. Are these all strategies on their part to jeopardise our children’s education?”

The South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU) provincial secretary Sibongile Kwazi said they are assessing the impact and will take up their frustration with the WCED after collecting all necessary information of the impact on the ground.

“Schools cannot cope and SGB’s cant afford to employ teachers. The WCED is not honouring staff establishment and there were no negotiation. There are other cost saving measurements that could have been implemented first before taking teachers out of classrooms.”