President Cyril Ramaphosa acknowledged on Monday that while government has made significant progress in education over the last three decades, from expanding access to school to steadily improving matric results, there are still huge challenges in the sector.

Ramaphosa wrote in his weekly letter to the nation that access to resources and quality teaching is uneven, noting that schools in townships and rural areas often struggle with overcrowding and educators have limited access to professional development and support.

Last week during his State of the Nation Address, Ramaphosa spoke about government’s work in education to prepare the youth to compete and thrive in a rapidly changing world.

He said meeting the constitutional mandate to provide quality education is an “all-of-society effort”.

One of the efforts to help fill the gap is the Basic Education Employment Initiative, founded in 2020 as part of the Presidential Employment Stimulus (PES). The initiative deploys young people to schools as education assistants.

To date, the school assistants programme has created more than 1.3-million work opportunities, Ramaphosa said, the largest youth employment programme in the country’s history.

“This is part of the goal of the Public Employment Stimulus to deliver public employment and livelihood programmes on a large scale while providing social value in the process,” Ramaphosa said.

He added that the young people involved in the programme go into schools well prepared.

“General school assistants need to at least have grade nine, while education assistants need at least a matric certificate. In the most recent phase of the programme, 32% of education assistants had some sort of tertiary qualification and 14% had a teaching qualification. Education assistants are provided with both compulsory and optional training including on school safety, online safety, financial literacy, word processing, AI fluency and coding,” he said.

Education assistants have been placed at 19 000 no-fee primary schools to support numeracy and as Reading Champions to support literacy and bilingual reading.

The effect of this intervention is being seen in rapid improvements in foundational literacy skills in many schools, Ramaphosa noted.

Beyond educational and curriculum support, education assistants are supporting digital learning, working in care and support with at-risk learners, and serving as laboratory and workshop assistants.

“This is not only good for the schools. For many of the school assistants, this experience is transformative. They are gaining skills and real work experience that will serve them well in finding employment and succeeding in their careers,” Ramaphosa said.

He said as government works to expand access to early childhood development (ECD) through the Bana Pele mass registration of ECD facilities and increase subsidies for ECD learners, the PES has stepped up support to the sector through the Social Employment Fund (SEF).

He explained that the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition, working with an implementing partner, is helping more than 1 000 previously disadvantaged, underfunded ECD centres to meet the qualifying criteria for an ECD subsidy.

“The centres are also receiving nutritional support for learners, as well as toys, books and learning materials. The work supported by the SEF now reaches over 50 000 children in ECD centres across the country,” he said.

Ramaphosa highlighted that these initiatives illustrate clearly the benefits of multisectoral cooperation between government, the private sector and civil society.