EDITORIAL: Why South Africa’s matric numbers don’t add up to success
The improvement is still not enough for a country in dire need of more engineers, scientists and mathematicians
24 January 2024 - 06:00
At face value, the 2023 matric results show steady improvement. Not nearly enough to justify President Cyril Ramaphosa’s contention that there is “a silent revolution taking place in our schools”, but an improvement, nevertheless.
What matters more than the increase in the overall pass rate — from 80.1% in 2022 to a record 82.9% in 2023 — is that the number of pupils whose marks qualify them to study for a bachelor’s degree climbed from 38.4% to 40.9%, its highest yet. In 2015, it was just 25.8%...
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