Last week Lumko High School in Amalinda became the first school to air programming from the Eastern Cape department of Education’s state of the art broadcasting studio, which broadcasts maths and science lessons tailored for matriculants, accessible not only during school hours but also after hours for reinforced learning.
This cutting-edge facility, housed at the Mandla Makupula Leadership Institute in Stirling, is designed to enhance e-learning programmes, and improve the matric performance in key subject areas across the province.
It was launched on August 26 and Lumko High School’s pupils formed part of the demonstration, officially becoming the first group of Buffalo City learners to have been given a glimpse into the department’s plans to integrate e-learning into existing in-person teaching methods.
A facilitator will teach content from the studio, and this will be aired to the department’s YouTube channel. From this channel, different schools can connect to live sessions and interact and ask questions from their various schools. The schools will also have access to the other content uploaded to the department’s YouTube channel which cover content related to the syllabus.
The department believes that incorporating broadcasting and digital platforms like YouTube into the classroom is set to help disadvantaged schools who do not have enough educators.
MEC, Fundile Gade with his acting HOD Sharon Maasdorp said their aim with this initiative is maximise the rich teaching experience in the Eastern Cape in maths and science by making it accessible, digitally, to all learners.
Gade said: “We are positioning the country in a better digital space as it is a demand internationally that we must be able to evolve to meet what becomes preliminary goals.
“In 2019 we introduced e-learning as part of enhancing the capacity of the state to address inefficacies.
He said they were determined to put in more facilities and ensure their aim is to be connected to at least two thousand schools across the province.
“Today we are launching the e-learning broadcasting platform in the context of what you see as facilities today.
“In the recent months we will also put the same facility in Cofimvaba connecting it with the science centre there.
“To ensure that the entire schools of the province can get broadcasting lessons.
“Key to that is how we connect to those schools, as we are committed to connecting 2000 schools across the province which we are busy working on.
“We will collect the best mathematical and science teachers who prioritise teaching and learning,” he said.
“We are blessed because we have the best science and mathematics teachers in the province so finding a better way of how to utilise them becomes critical.
“We are trying to make sure that our kids participate in the global space.
“This is just an intensification of efforts that were started some years ago but now we are being realistic about things,” said Gade.
The executive officer of the National Professional Teachers’ Organisation of South Africa, (NAPTOSA), Paula Botya said they were excited to see this project take off across the province as a counteract to the low matric performance in maths and science.
Botya said: “Teacher unions and the department are being innovative especially digitally and our learners stand to benefit a great deal from this.
“We hope that this promise for the Cofimvaba Science Centre installation will make this accessible to those children in rural areas equally with these townships and urban learners.
“We are getting there, and we congratulate the department on the strides they have made to nurture relationships with the private sector as without investment from business partners, digital advancement in education would move at a much slower pace.”
