Western Cape Education Sector Analysis

DOWNLOAD: Western Cape - Education Sector Analysis (English)

The Western Cape Education Sector Analysis, jointly prepared by the World Bank and South Africa's Western Cape Education Department (WCED), offers key insights and recommendations for improving the quality of learning in the province's schools while addressing the growing demand for access due to rising enrolments. The Western Cape is a coastal province in the southernmost tip of South Africa and is home to a culturally diverse population, spread across the province's picturesque agricultural and fishing towns, various townships and the city of Cape Town, with the famed Table Mountain.

In addition to its natural beauty and diversity, the province boasts higher learning levels than other provinces in South Africa, due to a combination of factors which include the WCED's active support to subsidize schools and support students from poor households, above and beyond what is required by national policy. Compared to other provinces, the Western Cape allocates significant funds to scholar transport and special needs education, and it is the only province of nine in South Africa that consistently administers learning assessments to track progress. The province also implemented its own targeted and comprehensive program in response to learning losses due to COVID-related school closures.

However, like the rest of South Africa, the Western Cape faces a learning crisis. In 2016, 55% of Grade 4 students in the Western Cape were found to be functionally illiterate on an international assessment that measures learning achievement (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, 2016). Reading levels further dipped in 2021 due to COVID-related school closures.

The Western Cape Education Sector Analysis offers four distinct, yet interlinked solutions to improve the quality of learning while expanding access to schooling to meet the rising demand driven by families moving to the province for economic opportunities.

1. Since learning is cumulative, improving the foundations of learning by strengthening Early Childhood Development (ECD) service provision, particularly for poor households, as well as learning in the early grades of primary education is a priority for the province. Existing evidence shows that investments in child development during the early years provide an exceptional rate of return as well as higher returns than investments in human capital at later stages.

2. Since teachers play a critical role in supporting learning, the province's relatively young teaching workforce provides an opportunity to gain impact by strengthening teacher effectiveness. Priorities include increased emphasis on early grades; focusing continuous professional development on how to teach to supplement what to teach (i.e., curriculum and assessment); by building teachers' capabilities to address a typically diverse range of student abilities within individual classrooms.

3. Investing in innovative education reform at this point in time, particularly Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) will help address the learning challenge and realize the high returns to education. PPPs are not new to the province, with the government supporting school choice, encouraging innovation through the provincial investment promotion body, Wesgro, subsidizing some independent schools, and investing in collaboration schools. An expansion of the innovative partnership experience is timely, given the pressure to expand the education system while simultaneously improving learning outcomes.

4. Investing in monitoring and evalution of all initiatives, to ensure that implementation is on track and that data is used to assess progress regularly and course correct as needed is key to this effort. In this regard, the capacity of the WCED to collect, assimilate, analyze and evaluate its programs could be strengthened and partnerships with research institutions further nurtured.

Download the WCED Education Sector Analysis to learn more.