NN40, May 2008
Education for Sustainable Development? Or The Sustainability of Education Investment? A Special Issue
Actioning Change - Responding to Growth and Development Imperatives for Education
By Fiona Lewis, Provincial Government Western Cape, South Africa
Email: filewis@pgwc.gov.zaKeywords
South Africa, Pro-poor Growth, Shared Growth, Developmental State, Quality and Outcomes, Balance
Summary
Continuing public investments in education must carefully balance the priorities of achieving global human rights goals such as equity and equality through universal access with that of chasing shared economic growth prospects through expanding the skills base. This paper explores the choices and trade-offs that result from this balancing act, and attempts to address the link between investments in education and shared, sustainable development.
Responding effectively and meaningfully to inequality and low levels of confidence in the quality of education requires decisive actions on the part of government and education to enhance and improve learner performance and success. With the South African government?s, and by proxy the people of the country?s, contribution to education expenditure the highest of all public institutions, the potential impact on economic and social outcomes is significant. Decisions that governments make regarding educational spending and educational service delivery are therefore critical. The South African government?s agenda in the second decade of democracy is to ensure that growth is pro-poor, that the growth agenda is shared by all the people of the country, and that to effect the change, the growth trajectory must be accelerated beyond the current levels. In an economic environment in which 23.6% of the population remain unemployed (of which the biggest proportion is the youth), the quality of the economic growth becomes a critical success factor in shifting the development path of the province. Within the province, this economic growth is guided by a provincial growth and development strategy which aims not only to guide public and private investment decisions and development spend, but to also present this as clearly articulated plan of action and basis for a sustainable development path [1].
For South Africa, gearing itself towards meeting a transformation agenda means crafting a ?developmental state? capable of directing the economy on a path of innovation, sustainable growth, redistribution, and poverty reduction in order to manage the delicate balance between growth and social development [2]. Achieving this shared growth within an education system demands responsiveness on the part of government to addressing issues of equity by ensuring access to a minimum standard of educational services and prioritizing empowerment by redressing historical disadvantages. Undoing the legacy of apartheid evident in the spatial planning of schools and the social exclusion of many disadvantaged communities requires commitment and strong political will. Therefore balancing growth in education over the four key service delivery platforms of early childhood development, general education and training (primary and lower secondary), further education and training (upper secondary), tertiary and adult basic education and training is critical. In this paper, we consider the factors and the context for decision-making as it relates to determining and maintaining the balance between these sectors, both within the country as a whole, and within the Western Cape specifically. We look at arguments that address the issues of universal primary education versus skills development, the attainment versus achievement as an indicator of quality education and identify several core cross-cutting education priorities. We also consider the argument of the sector wide approach (SWAP) and identify to what extent this approach has been implemented and is successful within the South African (and in particular, the Western Cape) context. Specifically, arguments are presented that relate to the financial resourcing constraints and the human resourcing constraints being faced within the Western Cape, and the impact these have upon the ability of the government to deliver on its mandate of quality education for all.
While it would seem apparent that the South African schooling system is not producing the learner outcomes that could be expected considering the allocation of resources in comparison with both developed and developing countries in Africa, the current climate for actioning education change agendas is ripe. The first decade of democracy pursued quantitative goals, and education policies and programmes reflected this, and so paid less attention to the issues of quality, and by proxy, to the issue of the sustainability of educational interventions. With the second decade of democracy upon us, while access (in terms of enrollment, attendance and participation) must still remain a priority in order to sustain the development successes of this first era, the debate must shift from inputs to outcomes [3], which are by their nature, more relevant and more sustainable. An outcomes orientation forces education planners and agents not just to reach a target or goal, but to ensure that their strategies, activities and interventions have a greater, longer term impact on educational achievement and performance of the system as a whole.
Critical to this change agenda must be the ongoing development of the human resources within the teaching and learning system. Quality teaching, quality support from school managers, quality supervision of performance and quality continuing education for staff is the key. This is where the investment and the allocation of resources must lie. Parallel to this, is the dual dimension of creating a solid platform for learning in the early childhood development years, and the transfer of the knowledge, skills, values and attitudes learnt throughout school into skilled learners completing their education and entering the workplace. If an educational system is not clear about its specific objectives and priorities, it lacks any rational basis and starting point for appraising and improving its performance, and for planning its future. However, we must emphasize that these programmes can only be successful if those responsible are committed. ?If we are to be successful?we would have to make some critical transitions. These include the transitions from policy to implementation, from strategy to programmes, from planning to delivery, from compliance to innovation and from caution to leadership? [4].
Notes
[1] The Provincial Growth and Development Strategy, Green Paper, October 2006 (available on Cape Gateway), p 10
[2] Trevor, Manuel, Minister of Finance, 2004. Budgeting challenges in the developmental state, Senior Management Service Conference, Cape Town.
[3] Outcomes are more than a combination of inputs and outputs (quantitative measures of performance), but are concerned with qualitatively measuring the quality of educational programmes.
[4] Premier Rasool ? State of the Province address 2007:3.
Further resources
READ the full text of this article.
The Western Cape Education Department appointed a small research unit to develop a series of position papers on a range of issues affecting education planning within the province. These papers (of which this paper is one in the series) are available on our website.
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