Foundation has been laid for a successful academic year: Nzimande

Higher education minister Blade Nzimande says the challenge facing his department is to develop a concrete plan to change the size and shape of the post-schooling education and teaching system to expand access for the youth and relieve pressure on universities.

Delivering his state of readiness remarks for the 2023 academic year, Nzimande said the department had implemented new monitoring schools and strategies to lay the foundation for a successful academic year and overcome the traditional bottlenecks that usually affect the system.

“We have deployed our officials across all our institutions to ascertain whether the registration processes at institutions are proceeding as planned and assist institutions with advice and guidance,” said Nzimande.

The minister said the department has opened its central applications clearing house (CACH) to enable access to all institutions to help students access the courses and programmes in the system. It  closes on March 31.

Nzimande said he was aware of hotspots and institutions battling with admissions, registrations, student financial aid and accommodation, and was working with institutions to resolve these issues.

He said as of this week, 25 of the country's 26 universities have commenced teaching, with a few extending their registration period to ensure that the department achieves as full an enrolment as possible, including making necessary arrangements to support students who registered late.

Nzimande said his department established a joint working group with the science and innovation department to develop inclusive plans and a common approach in response to challenges brought by load-shedding.

“Among the 18 of our institutions which responded, 10 developed plans, eight were still developing plans and others are adjusting their academic programmes in line with the load-shedding schedule. A majority of our institutions are also implementing hybrid teaching and learning methods.”

The minister said they were making advances towards introducing measures to support the categories of students including those not supported by the current NSFAS funding policy, citing that the department was finalising a comprehensive student funding model which they aimed to submit to the cabinet within the next two to three months.

Despite the work in progress, the minister lauded NSFAS for approving the provisional funding of a record of 1,083,055 students in the current financial year, calling it a huge milestone in the government’s commitment to fund working class and poor students. The projected budget is R47.6bn.

Nzimande also announced the introduction of a NSFAS bank account to ensure that beneficiaries of the scheme were paid directly and on time by eliminating third-party dependencies.

“NSFAS has also enabled a direct payment platform and a student accommodation platform to address challenges previously experienced that had a huge impact on student wellbeing.

“To manage the unregulated increasing costs for student accommodation, NSFAS has introduced a R45,000 cap on student accommodation. NSFAS introduced this cap to manage profiteering and price collusion by private providers,” said Nzimande.

Recognising that the post-school education and training sector was a microcosm of society, he said this was demonstrated “in the manifestation ... of social pathologies on our campuses such as rape, violence against women and mental illness”.

The department was introducing their framework on fighting gender-based violence and was set to include guidelines, protocols and infrastructure on how to respond to the pandemic, he said.

“The battle for gender equality and women’s emancipation, including the fight against GBVF will not be won unless boys and men are mobilised behind these efforts.”

Amid rising tensions in the sector around registration, Nzimande urged institutions to engage with students and trade unions to minimise chances of violent protests.

“While protests are legitimate, there must be no destruction of property and/or threat to life and limb.”

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