On day two of the Lekgotla, Ms Khanyisa Diamond, Head of Systems Capacity Support and Advisory: National Education Collaboration Trust (NECT), facilitated a panel discussion on Collaborations to enable maximum impact in provision of quality education. The panel featured representatives from the Sifiso Learning Group; the Zenex Foundation; Equal Education; the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA); and the British Council. It was agreed that innovative partnerships were required to advance the DBE mandate: if collaboration does not strengthen the state, it weakens the system. The importance of the five teacher unions in representing teachers on the ground was accentuated. Change in education takes time and collaboration is more than funding intervention but bringing the ecosystem together. Government must lead from the front and the importance of data sets to facilitate coordination, and less fragmentation was highlighted for maximum impact in delivering quality education. Strategic Partnerships for Transformative Education Quality, exploring innovations that strengthen resilience and efficiency at scale is required, whilst looking to home-grown solutions.
Commission recommendations to enhance quality education
The third and final day of the Lekgotla commenced with feedback and recommendations from the six commissions for enhanced quality education outcomes. The session was chaired by Mr Enoch Rabotapi from the Teachers, Human Resource and Institutional Development Branch, who advised that recommendations will be adopted in principle, with points of caution for further consideration.
Commission 1: Strengthening early development as national priority
The purpose of the commission was to obtain input and build consensus on the principles and actions in the ECD Blueprint to establish how to develop a sustainable early learning ecosystem, focused on those who were historically excluded, enabling affordable, equitable access to quality early learning programmes for children to thrive by five. The commission recommendations were to: Co-create a compelling societal narrative; appoint a national orchestration team; Deepen Provincial Education Departmental and Local Government collaboration; Establish a national Early Learning Programme (ELP) provider capacity-building commission; Make data more open and actionable by establishing Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), and access protocols; and Consolidate a Bana Pele Engagement Platform.
Commission 2: Strengthening foundational learning for a resilient system
The purpose of the commission was to examine ways to strengthen foundational learning across the DBE sector, focusing on Early Grade Reading and Numeracy. The top five recommendations were to: Strengthen system capacitation for coordination and alignment across levels; Institutionalise a Common Instructional Approach: Consolidate learning benchmarks: Improve the quality and quantity of School-Based Assessment (SBA); and Establish system-wide performance indicators and a common Monitoring and Evaluation Framework.
Commission 3: Assessment of the current PPN model and its systemic challenges
Post Provisioning Norms should be aligned with the current development provisions that relate to the curriculum, socio-economic development, equity and redress. The purpose of the commission was to assess and address systemic gaps and opportunities for an inclusive, responsive educator allocation system. The recommendations for the commission were to: Review the quintile system and establish a Technical Task Team in this regard; Review PPN factors such as class size; Shift towards learner-centred resourcing for inclusion; Protect education funding; and Strengthen data integrity.
Commission 4: Learning for an unknown future
The purpose of the commission was to improve the quality and relevance of teaching and learning experiences of STEM subjects to increase learner participation and performance across the system. The recommendations included: Developing an agreed upon approach to STEM education across the SA schooling system from foundational skills to the world of work and post schooling; Review and implement the PPN to strengthen STEM implementation; Strengthening Initial Teacher Education (ITE) and teacher continuous professional development in STEM across the General Education and Training and Further Education and Training bands; Strengthen and align the STEM curriculum, teacher development, assessment and support systems for a changing world; and Define infrastructure and resource toolkits for schools to support STEM implementation.
Commission 5: Learning environments that nurture inclusion, resilience, safety and belonging
The purpose of the commission was to examine learning environments that nurture inclusion, safety and belonging as part of the Care and Support for Teaching and Learning (CSTL) Framework. The commission recommendations included: a national intergovernmental roadmap for nutritional health; Integration of school-level budget reporting into SA-SAMS to improve efficiency, functionality and accountability; implement a multi-impact delivery of nutrition programming; establish integrated, aligned, multi-level monitoring tools integrated into SA-SAMS; and Strengthen the NSNP HEDCOM-Subcommittee for challenges beyond the DBE’s mandate.
Commission 6: Strengthening continuity and coherence in MTbBE: lessons learned and strategic directions for Grade 5 implementation in 2026
The commission agreed that MTbBE is now a national priority, and not a peripheral reform, strengthening the linguistic foundations of learning through both MTbBE and MTbRL, ensuring system coherence across curriculum, pedagogy, assessment and teacher development. The commission recommendations include: Treating Grade 5 as a continuation phase within MTbBE rollout; Aligning curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment across languages; Institutionalising MTbRL as the foundation for reading for meaning; Strengthening teacher professional learning for bilingual pedagogy; Embedding monitoring, evaluation, and learning within implementation; Implementing structured provincial piloting with national coherence; Strengthening sustainability through costed programme architecture; Aligning system enablers for MTbBE and MTbRL for scale; Aligning ECD with MTbBE/MTbRL principles; Including the South African Sign Language in the DBE references; and Tightening governance, accountability, and advocacy structures.