The latest edition of the South Africa Economic Update, titled "Learning: Overdue Reforms and Emerging Priorities in Basic Education," examines the country's economic outlook with a focus on its basic education system. The report highlights that South Africa's economy in 2024 continued to progress slowly, marked by high fiscal deficits despite a successful political transition and an absence of energy load shedding. While financial and external sectors showed slight improvement, government accounts deteriorated, resulting in a GDP growth rate of 0.8%. This is an improvement from 2023 but remains below the average for middle-income countries.
The report emphasizes the importance of education in equipping young people with necessary knowledge and skills for economic success and addressing inequalities. However, it identifies a learning crisis coupled with declining education budgets as significant challenges that could negatively impact both individuals and national development.
To address these issues, the report suggests three key actions:
1. **Focus on Early Education**: The recommendation is to enhance early grade reading programs through improved teaching quality supported by structured lesson plans, coaching, high-quality books, and regular assessments. It also calls for increased access to quality Early Childhood Development (ECD), especially for disadvantaged children.
2. **Leverage Private Sector**: By partnering with private providers including non-governmental organizations, the aim is to expand school networks and improve learning outcomes affordably. Successful pilot partnerships can be scaled up alongside testing other partnership models.
3. **Enhance Efficiency and Equity**: Improving teacher performance is prioritized through adopting Teacher Professional Standards amid new teachers entering the system. Resources should be targeted towards schools serving underprivileged learners with low performance levels. This includes reviewing teacher allocation to needy schools and revitalizing a national assessment system for regular data collection on learning performance.