School Funding in ZA

Last Thursday I had a conversation with a teacher at the school about several education-related issues. After briefly discussing race, a theme that must be forever in the minds of ZA citizens (more on that later), our conversation moved towards funding and resources, as it tends to do with teachers. She expressed her frustrations with the Ministry of Education (also referred to as the Dept. of Education, though I like "ministry" because it sounds so Harry Potter-isk), and I couldn't help but to compare her frustrations with my own and thousands of teachers back home. It seems that there is a pandemic of apathy towards education... so, take heart teachers of Ohio, Wisconsin, and Michigan: you are not alone!

 Does that make you feel better? Me either.

I am going to divulge what I learned in a bulleted list. This will keep me from droning on. Also, because I love bulleted lists.

There is quite a lot that is different when it comes to education in ZA, compared to the US, but the underlying problems that they have-- funding-related-- are very much the same. Education is not really valued here. It makes me sad for our kids, for our world.


Here we go! This is going to be a bit of info. You might want to attack this in waves. :)

• The Ed. Ministry only pays for half of teachers' salaries at HH. They do not pay anything for "classified" staff. There are approximately 45 teachers, three administrators, and around 15 classified staff. The money that is used to pay the other half of teachers' salaries as well as those of the classified staff (I don't know about administrators) comes from student school fees and contributions/donations to the school. So approximately 23 teachers and 15 classified staff are paid annually through those fees/contributions.
  
• Here is a run-down of the school fees, or basically, how HH is able to pay teachers and staff.
  Keep in mind that approximately R 7.5 is equal to 1 USD (the 'R' is the Rand-- ZA currency).
  
•  A non refundable deposit of R 500 ($67 USD) is required upon acceptance. Students must apply for primary school as students back home would apply for college. The headmaster told me that there were over 400 applicants for grade one for the upcoming 2013 school year. There are only 100 some-odd openings.
  
• Tuition February to November: R 865 per month ($115 USD)
  
• Stationary Fee R 250 ($33 USD) Annually, for all writing books and textbook hire
  
• Aftercare, which can be provided by the school, costs money, though I am not sure the specifics.
  
• There are fees for music students and practice sessions. If my student played the clarinet in the band at HH and practiced from 12:45- 3:30pm, it would cost me R 620/year ($90 USD).
  
• So, for one school year (with my child playing an instrument because that matters to me) it is going to cost me R 10,020 ($1336 USD)-- not including childcare as I am a working mom, and/or single parent.
• What the Ed. Ministry gives the school for funding (resources, utilities, etc.) does not even cover the cost of electricity for an entire school year (Jan-Dec). Bearing in mind that there is no heat and the only room that is air conditioned is the computer lab. EVERYTHING else comes from student school fees and contributions/donations.
  
• There are some schools where students do not have to pay school fees. The teacher that I spoke with said, "you get what you pay for." Taking into account the sum of money that the schools get from the Ed. Ministry (very little) and how much of the staff salaries' the Ministry actually pays (maybe half), I can understand her perspective. My questions are: How do they pay their teachers? How do they keep excellent teachers? How do they get $$ for resources?
  
• Embezzlement is a serious problem here. According to the teacher I spoke with, there is little to no accountability for administrators, government employees, etc., and so taking the money that is set aside for schools is pretty simple and consequence-free.
  
• Township schools, those which, in my opinion, need the most funding and the best teachers, receive very little money. And according to the teacher I spoke with, the teachers don't always have the same degree but make the same salary as the other Ed. Dept. teachers. She was very frustrated with this particular issue. She regards the township teachers as "lazy."
  
  I have been to township schools and seen the classrooms, the teachers and students. I also have seen with what little those teachers have to work. I cannot imagine teaching effectively in those conditions-- degree or no degree.

I am not sure how funding goes for each and every school in ZA, though, I would speculate that things are very similar across the board; the government has no money. Being at HH and talking with the teachers and staff has given me so much insight into this country's education crisis. It is similar to that of the US. There is not enough money being pumped into the schools in either case, and it is causing problems. The difference is that the US has money (ha) to allocate while ZA does not. When a school has limited resources and has to cut good teachers and essential programs, no matter what the case, there are problems. 

I am worried for our world. What happens when the apathy we feel toward funding education becomes the apathy we feel toward education as a whole? Or do they go hand-in-hand? I am interested to know how other countries fund education. What, out there, is working? 

Sarah

Kragga Kamma

On April 14 (after elephant riding at Kwantu) Britt and I went to Kragga Kamma Game Park specifically to see Rhinos. We got to see them and much much more!


I'm not going to do much writing, just posting photos. Enjoy!

Ooooh, I love giraffes!

So close! 

African Box Turtle

Warthogs, or as the little girl sitting behind me on the truck called them, "Pumbas!"
The big one is the male. 

This is a Vervet Monkey. I thought he was going to attack me. Seriously. When a monkey gives you the death stare the only thing you can do is death stare back.

 He came right up to the truck and was crazily searching for food. 

Chillin' 

"Five little monkeys swinging from the trees..."

White Rhino Mama and baby & a warthog

The "baby" is only 1 year old

Male Nyala

Mountain Reedbuck

Ostrich (female)

Ostrich (male- you can tell because of the bright black feathers)

Impalla- buck (male)

Cheetah! 

Cheetah Mama and babies

We had a marvelous time. Seeing animals in their natural habitat is such an awesome thing!

Sarah

Elephant Riding

On April 14 I rode an elephant.

Britt and I rented another car and went back to Kwantu for our rain-checked elephant ride. We did not get lost this time! w00t! We rode the elephants for about 30 minutes and then were able to feed them, all four of them, tasty treats. There is no way that I can explain how cool it was to ride and feed elephants. Hopefully the photos can give you some idea...

Elephants are matriarchal which means that they are lead by a dominant female.  A majority of the elephants in a herd will be female with the exception of a few immature males. The mature males go out on their own only coming around to mate.

Elephants carry their babies for approximately 22 months.

Elephants in the wild live up to approxiately 75 years while elephants in sanctuaries, like Kwantu, can live up to 100 years. In sanctuaries they are protected from the elements, given vitamins and healthy foods to supplement their diets, and tended to when sick. 

Our guide said that training elephants is similar to training dogs: they use a lot of treats to form habits. As the elephants were coming out to play the guide called out random commands, "right," "left," "forward" and "stop." The elephants followed each of the commands perfectly. It was pretty cool. You could tell they each had their own personality. The gal on the middle right kept trying to get food out of the middle left gal's mouth. They were smacking each other with their trunks.

Here we go! My elephant was Lacey. She was gorgeous.

The elephant's skin was rough. I was warned that their skin was very coarse (hence the long pants) but wasn't imagining it the way it actually felt. Imagine the way that a callous feels. Now imagine that texture covering the enormous body of an elephant. That is exactly how their skin felt. Though their body is covered in callous-thick hide, behind their large ears is satin-smooth (I felt them, so I can vouch for this piece of info!). They have hundreds of blood vessels behind their ears which they use as fans on hot days. These keep the skin here tender and smooth.

Did you know that though elephants are gigantic creatures they can sneak up on people? They do not stomp around like we teach our kids... they walk very gently. Also, elephants can send information to other elephants through the vibrations in the ground. They can feel vibrations from up to several kilometers (even more miles) serving as warnings, information about herds, predators, etc. 

FAVORITE PART: I got to FEED the elephants!!!!

I was so excited I couldn't even stand it!

Reeeeeeeeeach.

We could put the food directly in their mouths (sticky, hot and stinky-- but fun!), or in their trunk---> they would feed themselves that way.

This gal had ants in her pants. Super impatient elephant alert.
P.S. I got hit in the head by her trunk because she couldn't wait for her goodies.

"Quick. Staring contest. You. Me. Now."

Britt putting food in the elephants trunk.

Their trunks were amazing. Elephants have "fingers" on the ends of their trunks. We dropped quite a bit of food on the ground. Getting the food in their mouths was a bit tricky. I didn't want to get chomped. No matter, the elephants used the fingers on the tips of their trunks to pick up the treats. Did you know that elephants have "fingers?" They do.

There isn't anything quite like an elephant. They are truly incredible.

"Please don't hit me again, baby girl."

This is where the elephants come to sleep at night. The ceiling has some kind of electrical heating element to circulate heat on cold evenings. The trainers tend to the elephants every day.

Going back to the wild, trainers at their side.

Would I do this again? In a heartbeat. This is by far my favorite South African adventure.

Sarah

Zebras, and Giraffes, and Wildebeest, Oh My!

Over break, Britt and I rented a car and drove to Kwantu Game Reserve for our first ever Game Drive (safari). The GPS took us the wrong way (I think I many have taken a wrong turn...) and we ended up on this crazy dirt road in our little Chrysler Sparklite (refer to previous post for photo of the smallest car ever). It was quite the adventure. Who knew we would be off-roading, 10,000 miles from home, in a clown car? Here is a photo of the road less traveled... seriously...

Due to our ridiculous detour we arrived to Kwantu almost two hours late. Because of that, however, we went on our own personal game drive- which was really cool. We saw zebras, giraffes, wildebeest, tons of deer-like creatures with various names such as bushbok, springbok, blessbok, etc., turtles, mongoose, ostriches and lions. The Kwantu game reserve is huge, home to South Africa's Big Five -- elephants, lions, buffalo, rhinos and cheetah. We spent two hours tracking elusive animals with our guide. There isn't anything quite like being in the wild with some of God's coolest creatures.

Unfortunately for us we didn't get to see elephants, lions (except those that were in captivity), buffalo or rhinos. It was a cloudy and somewhat rainy day and, according to our guide, the animals tend to hide away in the bush on crummy days. Even still, we got to see some really cool creatures-- giraffes and zebras, HELLO!?-- and spend a few hours in the beautiful South African plains. It was a fantastic day.

This was our game drive guide. I cannot, for the life of me, remember his name.
He was a funny and very knowledgeable guy-- been in the animal business for going on 11 years. 

This photo is a bit deceiving... we have already gone on the drive at this point. But we look like we are justing getting ready to set off on the adventure! We had this truck and the guide all to ourselves! 

The African plains. Nothing like it.

We spotted a herd of wildebeest. Our guide told us that when a predator or potential threat are around the entire herd will stop what they are doing, turn and stare in the direction of the threat. I can see why... it was quite intimidating.

We saw so many zebras during the drive. These zebras are not the typical zebra that we think of (according to our guide). These zebras are Burschell's zebras-- they are specific to the region. You can tell the difference by the stripes. The strips on these zebras (pronouced "ze-bras" --NOT "zee-bras"-- by South Africans) wrap around their bellies and across their bums. Also, there is a brownish-orange shadow strip down the white strips. The baby zebras have orange hair. They are beautiful.

It was a super cold day. We had blankets on the drive! It was probably in the  low 50's. NOT something we are used to in ZA!

Do you see what I see?! Our guide was tracking the lions during our whole trip. We really wanted to see them! Unfortunately, these tracks are all that we saw of the wild lions. Still, pretty incredible, right?

More lion tracks. The reserve has 4 wild lions-- one male, a female and two cubs. They limit the number of lions within the reserve. Why would they do that?

To maintain a proportional predator-prey ratio. Good thinking.

While he was tracking the lions our guide spotted some serious big bugs. I cannot remember what kind of a beetle this is! There were two of them on the side of the road and the guide spotted them right away. Homie has some good eyes.

A little bigger than a quarter. Yikes.

Do you know what this is? We all saw these all over the place out on the plains and in the bush. Britt and I thought they were rocks. Nope. Wrong-o. These are termite mounds. They are gigantic. This one was about four feet tall! Our guide told us that they are about as big underground as they are above ground.

The houses in South Africa are made with cinder blocks and concrete. Why? For two reasons-- 1. The weather is temperate so there is not real need for insulation. There aren't very many houses with AC (not that I have seen, anyway) or heat;  2. TERMITES. There are some crazy termites out here. They could probably eat a house in 24 hours. OK, I may be exaggerating. Look it up to see for yourself how long it would take. I would assume, by the size of these mounds that it wouldn't take much time at all. 

Look what we found when our guide was tracking lions! We came upon a herd of giraffes-- 6 giraffes! Our guide gave us some really cool information about giraffes: male giraffes are very brightly colored. Why? To attract the less-colorful females. There are quite a few animals in nature (a lot, actually) that mate this way: the male is bright and colorful or does colorful/interesting things to attract the female.

Do you know how a giraffe sleeps? Apparently, they sleep for minutes at a time (between 7 and 10) and keep their head up when they are sleeping. 

A giraffe's heart is very powerful, after all, it has to pump blood all the way up that long neck.

We passed this right before we spotted the giraffes. This is a seventeenth century inn-- built in the 1860s. By the looks of it there were probably four or five rooms. This is literally in the middle of nowhere. Can you imagine living in the middle of the bush, with predators like cheetah and lions and your nearest neighbors miles and miles and miles away? That is how the Afrikaners rolled back in those days.

Notice the bark on the trees in this photo and the one above. Elephants eat the bark off of these trees which ends up killing the trees. 

You can see the brownish-orange shadow stripe that I was telling you about.... Zebras are probably my favorite animal. We have such a fun and creative God, eh?

Ostrich eggs - HUGE

We finally got to see some lions! They were in an enclosure, but as beautiful as ever. These lions are young (only a couple of years old). I can't remember where it is they got them from-- the reserve is looking for a place that they can take them so that they can live in the wild.

We had a wonderful time on our game drive! Seeing all of the animals and being in their natural habitats was one of the coolest experiences that I have ever had.

Sarah