Eager Students Fall Prey to Apartheid’s Legacy

I viewed a video version of this article, with a similar title, on the NYT homepage this morning. The video starts out with african students singing, an activity which is shown about three more times during the 3-minute-long video, including in what is supposedly a math class (the math teacher explains that this motivates the students).

I was eager to hear how whites are responsible for these latest numbers indicating black shortcomings, but the best the reporter could come up with was that under apartheid, blacks were educated with non-executive careers in mind, and that this has irreparably crippled South Africa’s black teachers. Surely then, they could import some top quality teachers from other African countries, many of whose citizens mysteriously still want very badly to emigrate to South Africa.

Having spent her only argument, the reporter then goes on to admit that a major problem in South African schools is in fact absenteeism by the teachers.

They also interview a couple of students who are nice enough but don’t appear particularly bright. The principal of the school then asserts that hope and encouragement are all that are needed for these young scholars to blossom into South Africa’s new leading class.

The fact is that not everyone has what it takes to become a “leader” or a highly-paid professional. That’s just life. Letting children know that having a regular job is perfectly honorable is more honest and leads to less anger at the system (whitey) by young adults when they don’t get into med school.

This reminds me a bit of the article on the “Afri-centric” school in Toronto the other day. At the inauguration of the school, one of the speakers gushed that all the students are going to be leaders. Well, we know that most of them will not in fact be leaders, but they will harbor a lot of resentment when they are constantly told that they can become important and rich and these things don’t materialize.

If you can bear to slog through this p.c. article you find that the blacks in South Africa received better educations under white rule at far less cost to taxpayers.

The students complain about their Stepin Fetchit-like teachers who goof off, arrive late (on C.P.T.) or don’t even show up for work at all.

But since blacks are never responsible for any of their problems the NY Times calls this a “legacy of Apartheid” just as they blame poor black behavior in the US on “the legacy of slavery”.

I object to the title of this article. It implies that the students are innocent victims of a bad system. Instead, the reality of the matter is that low IQ students help to create a bad system.

The bit about the teachers not getting good educations, as a cause of their own students’ delinquencies, is a cop-out. I was blessed to have good teachers, but I also learned a lot of things I learned on my own, before the subject matter ever came up in organized education. Are we to think that I couldn’t have learned advanced arithmetic at the age of eight because my sixth grade (ages 11-12) math teacher wasn’t a straight-A math student in college? Get real.

Here we go again………naughty white man & his apartheid.

You know nothing about the education system in South Africa in the past or the present New York Times.

During Apartheid the standards for black kids were higher than they are today. The problem today is that the teachers are under resourced, generally could not care about educating a mob of kids, intenet on killing or raping one another. To add to it all the government would rather have an uneducated population that will do as it’s told woithout question.

Funny how the whites ensure their kids are educated amongst all
the nonsense that’s going on….Just like in the USA.

Its not the standards of education that’s all screwed up, it’s the black kids doing what they normally do.

Anyone want to bet these African teachers show up to teach in all the sartorial splendor that money can buy as they fail the kids? They do so in Detroit schools. Best dressed incompetent teachers in the U.S, there. Then again, there’s Washington D.C.

Despite sharp increases in education spending since apartheid ended, South African children consistently score at or near rock bottom on international achievement tests, even measured against far poorer African countries. This bodes ill for South Africa’s ability to compete in a globalized economy, or to fill its yawning demand for skilled workers.

Different nation, same results.

Black failure is universal.

I like the comment about this bodes ill for a global economy. Look for calls for global intervention (money from rich nations) to solve a problem that can’t be solved with money.

Whitey is not there to maintain law and order anymore. Africans are slowly reverting back to the tribalism that is their natural rule of law and way of life. Now if we would just stop sending so much danged foreign aid maybe the populations in that part of the world would at least stabilize.

“Poorly educated South African teachers turn out even less educated students.”

It will be even worse in America if Obama gets his way. Blacks will not only be teachers, they’ll be in every other profession as well, and it will be because of the small print in the healthcare bill mandating non-white quotas; the cap and trade legislation doing exactly the same, and everything else that the Obamanation thinks he can alter to enhance black privileges.

There will be doctors who periodically kill people; even more lawyers who don’t really know law; engineers that build sub-standard structures that often collapse; and the result of it all will be that this society, in effect, will be no different than any other banana republic in the world.

The only thing that will prevent this “new” America reaching fruition will be an economic collapse and a break up of the country into various secessionist states along lines of race, politics and ethnicity.

Not a very optimistic-looking future is it?

“Here in the Western Cape, only 2 out of 1,000 sixth graders in predominantly black schools passed a mathematics test at grade level in 2005, compared with almost 2 out of 3 children in schools once reserved for whites that are now integrated, but generally in more affluent neighborhoods.”

And in those integrated schools, what colour are the 2 out of 3 children that pass the maths test? Please tell us. I think we all know what the answer will be though!

But blacks had better education under apartheid. And lower HIV rates. And lower murder rates. And lower rape rates. And … well, I guess it would be too much for the media to write something good about white devils and something bad about black angels.

A dirty little secret:

most of the white libs who prattle on about the legacy of this or that depressing black test scores don’t really believe what they are saying.

I used to babble like that too, & I never believed a word of it.

like everyone, blacks need to be educated to the level of their abilities.

This basically means trades & simple occupations for most, and the professions for an infinitesimal minority.

everyone knows this, & everyone always has.

only censorship and intimidation keeps the blabber jabber alive.

I have written on many occasions to Celia Dugger and especially to her husband, Barry Bearak - another NYT reporter, based like his wife Ms. Dugger in SA - and it is interesting to note that each time I write to one of these high-profile NYT journalists (including among others Steven Erlanger, Randy Cohen, Adam Nossinger, etc.), I always - repeat ALWAYS get back apologist email that seems to me to suggest that the Times writer(s) actually agrees with my reason for writing.

[In the case of a recent Barry Bearak article which appeared in the NYT on September 9th entitled “A Stir Over a Faraway View of Black and White”, I was actually quite surprised by the appeasing nature of Bearak’s reply - it’s almost as though, having lived for years among South African blacks, in the most Aids-infested, crime-riddled, poorly black-managed country on Earth, Barry and his wife know the truth, yet are forced to write racially sensitive and neutral copy in order to preserve their jobs].

If any Amrenners would like to read my correspondence with these NYT wishful-thinking pre-programmed leftists, just drop me a line and I will gladly oblige.

It’s actually quite eye-opening stuff: the ethos of the Left is so ingrained in the politics of the unreal, of the unreality of their wishful-thiking Utopia, that with grade-school level reasoning their argument crumbles like an overbake fruit cake (no pun).

I will continue to correspond with big-name national “newspapers of record” both here and in Europe, and will keep you informed.

Best,

Semi-anonymous from Nola.

“Most teachers in South Africa’s schools today got inferior educations under the Bantu system, …”

Actually, most of these teachers are not qualified to be teaching at all. They are there as affirmative action deployees, having been ‘given jobs’ after the white teachers were sacked by the incoming ANC government in 1994. It is now common cause that the consequentially disastrous decline in black education be blamed on the previous ‘apartheid’ educational system. Diversion of blame is a top African attribute.

It should be borne in mind that no South African blacks had ever set up or previously received any formal education, and it was only with the Afrikaner government coming to power in 1948 that an obligation was felt to set up a ‘Bantu Education’ system - paid for by the whites of course, who constituted just 10% of the population. So, with a totally clean slate where do you start - with the parents or with the children? It was decided that starting with the children was the only viable option, despite many parents in rural areas being opposed to education because daily schooling would deprive the family of a farmhand.

It should be further remembered that these parents, being illiterate and innumerate, were unable to help with homework or to provide vital motivation. Accordingly, the standard of education delivered (by white teachers of course), had to be designed to fit both the circumstances, as well as the intellectual capacity of the pupils involved.

Such ‘apartheid’ education has received many brickbats, but the original architects of the system have since been shown to have displayed remarkable foresight. See recent research from UCLA at: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090317142841.htm

If education in America wasn’t free and compulsory, most black Americans would never learn to read. Even with free and compulsory education a lot of black kids don’t learn to read.

They’ll move little Tyrone through a half-dozen different school districts the year he is in first grade, and keep up the chaos for the rest of his school years. With a below-average IQ and completely selfish parents, it is a miracle if he DOESN’T end up as a functional illiterate.

I agree with the poster above who mentioned the attitude problems that result from telling a child thousands of times over 13 years of schooling that he can be anything that he wants to be, that he is going to be a leader, that everybody is a winner, etc.

I saw an interview with a young Latina in Texas a while back. She was disdainful of her mother who worked as a maid, and stated that she wasn’t going to spend her life cleaning other people’s toilets, yet she was an illegal alien and didn’t appear to have any particularly outstanding academic gifts. The public schools are cranking out an entire generation of people who think that they are going to get a college diploma in ethnic studies and then immediately move into a corner office in a Fortune 500 company.

Having left school, qualified or not, there are very few jobs actually available. Any ‘openings’ will already have been allocated to family or tribal members where education and qualifications play no part in the selection procedure. Corruption, bribery and criminal activity will provide an income just as it does in the rest of black africa. As for singing during a maths class, perhaps this can be balanced by doing maths during the music lesson. I note there is no mention of Oprah’s much vaunted academy for girls which promised that students would be turned into future leaders in the ‘rainbow’ nation. No rainbow I ever saw had any black in it, nor is there any evidence of a pot of gold to be found at the end as folklore predicts. “..got inferior educations..”, that phrase from this story explains everything.

This article cheered me up. South African blacks are going nowhere fast. So much for “free” South Africa.

The real issue is whether whites can retain power in the academic and economic areas or whether emigration is the wise course. Based on the self delusion of the blacks who believe that all good things will come to them magically because apartheid is over, I must wonder why any white remains in South Africa. Leave now and let the blacks sink deeper into the muck they so richly deserve.

Yeah, we can shake our heads and say “see I toldyaso” all day long. The simple fact of the matter is that it’s happening here as we twitter away. Tucson recently fired a bunch of white teachers and replaced them with less qualified “minority” teachers. You can read about it on the cofcc web site…

“The public schools are cranking out an entire generation of people who think that they are going to get a college diploma in ethnic studies and then immediately move into a corner office in a Fortune 500 company.”

If the US adopts Scandinavian business laws they probably will get that corner office. 40% women directors by law or they close you down in Norway and soon Sweden. Quotas for management etc. regardless of skill or background.

If the education system under apartheid was to blame for black students failing to finish matric, then we shoould have seen a massive increase in the number of eager young black minds, making use of their new freedom to become educated. In reality we saw a further drop in the number of blacks manging to finish school. This in spite of the fact that the standard of education was dropped through the floor.

The truth remains uncomfortable and it is IQ related.

“Teachers are not tested on subject knowledge, but one study of third-grade teachers’ literacy, for example, found that the majority of them scored less than 50 percent on a test for sixth graders.”

Sounds like those affirmative action black teachers and 6 figure administrators who run our public schools.

I was at the library the other day. The girl sitting next to me was reading a test book for the state teacher’s exam. I told her not to bother, the teacher’s exam was very easy. She started showing me some of the questions, 3rd grade math problems, reading comprehension questions also suitable for 3rd grade etc.

She was shocked. I wasn’t

US Embassy in South Africa Closed Due to Security Threat

Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Christopher Szabo
The United States Embassy and other US government facilities in South Africa have been closed down because of an undisclosed security threat. The South African police, however, say the threat is under control.

According to iafrica.com, United States embassy spokesperson Sharon Hudson-Dean said only: We received information from the regional security office, which I cannot discuss. Meanwhile, South African Police Commissioner Bheki Cele told reporters in Cape Town that South African intelligence was in touch with their American counterparts, News24 said. Officials would not say anything besides these tight-lipped utterances. A US State Department official warned American citizens to be…

16 — feller wrote at 6:45 AM on September 22:

…..” I must wonder why any white remains in South Africa. “……..

Answer; Natural Resources like gold and diamond mines. There has also been a lot of money spent lately setting up permanent safari camps for wealthy whites. There are areas for hunting, “ecological touring,” and even big areas for the uninhibited use of off road recreational vehicles. These places are set up far from the cities and as far as I last knew, are doing great business.

To:-

“from Nola”, comment Number 12. I would be interested in reading some of that corresponence, but I couldn’t send an email by clicking on your name. If you read this message, please could you send me the info?

Many Thanks

My wife taught in one of the Black Teachers Training colleges way back in the late 1950’s when I was an Agricultural officer in the same tribal area. She recently told me that the facilities were just as good as any white college.Unfortunately the Nationalist Government was so touchy about everything and so insistant on pushing Afrikaans it interfered with my work.They kept on demanding that I take Afrikaans tests.It was at the time of Sharpville so life was difficult especially for English speakers.Still the Agricultuarl staff and teachers were all very dedicated.

When, in its infinite wisdom, the African National Congress in 1997 inflicted on South Africa’s kids a Western fad known as Outcomes Based Education (OBE), your correspondent was a lonely voice in opposition predicting chaos in the schoolroom and disaster for the pupils, or “learners” in OBE-speak.

Then Education Minister Sibusiso Bengu, an eminently decent but sadly misguided politician, responding to my harsh criticism of OBE, essentially accused me of racism, disguising the insult in the weasel term, “elitist”.

This is what I wrote at that time: “Be warned (of) what will happen in South Africa if OBE is set loose on our kids.

They will not learn basic skills simply because they will not be taught them.

They will not learn that there are deadlines in life, that certain tasks have to be performed within a certain time frame.

That is taboo in OBE. Each child must progress at his or her own pace. “Unit standards – instead of grades – will be granted no matter how many attempts are made by the student to earn them.

No one fails.

The student just goes on and on until he or she gets the ‘appropriate’ number of standard units, whatever they might be and no one seems able to define the term. “In the end, say the OBEists, well-rounded citizens who believe in the group approach to all problems and who enjoy high ‘self-esteem’ will be produced.

Of course, they may be weak in reading, writing and arithmetic. But what’s important is that they’ll think they’re terrific.”

Today we, our children and the nation, reap the whirlwind of ANC ignorance and arrogance. They listen to no one, take no advice; they are all-knowing and infallible. But what have they done to the schoolchildren? Today, according to no less than one of the principal architects of OBE in South Africa, Graeme Bloch, OBE has resulted in this country being ranked near the bottom of the class in world education and among the worst in maths and literacy.

What a disgrace for a nation that has produced Nobel laureates, eminent jurists, world-renowned medical experts, famous authors and poets, international business leaders, military heroes in two world wars and statesmen of great distinction.

Bloch, who is the Development Bank of Southern Africa education specialist, has the good grace to admit that OBE created a shallow view of empowerment in which the student’s voice was substituted for the hard task of learning the basics. He points out that about 80% of SA schools are dysfunctional and the university admission rate is one of the lowest in the world – only 15% of those who pass matric further their education.

Thus the very foundations of our future are rotten.

Instead of hard-working, tax-paying citizens, we are producing an entire generation of illiterates who think they are entitled to the good life and will seize it, by crime and violence if necessary, regardless of their illiteracy. They are the victims, as are we all, of the ANC’s intransigence and arrogance.

Why didn’t the ANC build upon what was good in our society instead of tearing it apart? Similarly, those highly effective special police units dealing exclusively with sexual assaults and child abuse were disbanded, their expert and dedicated staffs scattered far and wide to dysfunctional police stations.

Gone was the collegial sharing of information and the professional care given to victims of these heinous crimes all of which assisted in both treating the abused and tracing the perpetrators. Will the ANC never learn?
TwitThis

A4:

I wouldn’t want Outhouse-Based Education in a white school. But it’s irrelevant when dealing with blacks, for worrying about a hare-brained scheme ruining black education makes about as much sense as worrying about water being wet or worrying that a person who just turned 108 is getting old. I do think that OBE and other snake-oil schemes like that are intertwined with race because they have to dumb down the curriculum so that everybody can learn it, and by “everybody,” that means enough blacks and Hispanics.

This is nothing new. Just look at the schools in any predominantly black city in the USA. You will find that educational “standards” do not exist. Of course, the “teacher unions” will blame it on lack of funds rather than an incompetent, dysfunctional system, even though private and parochial schools can teach well at HALF the funds. Yes this dysfunctionality includes the “parent(s)”.