The Departments of Basic Education and Employment and Labour (DEL) are implementing the Basic Education Employment Initiative (BEEI), a component of the Presidential Employment Stimulus (PES) by providing 204,000 job opportunities to youth between the ages of 18-34 years.  These youth will be placed in approximately 20,000 public ordinary schools and Schools for Learners with Special Needs (LSEN). The Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) is the identified Payroll master for the programme.  All Assistants will receive their stipends directly from the IDC. The project aims to place young people in schools to support teaching and learning, reduce the administrative burdens on teachers and protect teaching and learning time.  The opportunities available for young people include Reading Champions; Curriculum Assistants; e-Cadres such as ICT Champions; Care and Support Assistants; Laboratory Assistants; Workshop Assistants; Sports and Enrichment Assistants and Handymen and women for maintenance jobs. Applications can be submitted through SAYouth.mobi from 22 April to 9 May 2025. 

Ms Lala Maje, Director for Initial Teacher Education explained: “This initiative comes as South Africa continues to battle high levels of youth unemployment and an education system that is stretched and overburdened during these difficult economic conditions. Phase V of the BEEI, a component of PES offers a timely intervention. What makes this phase particularly noteworthy is that it is funded by the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF), administered by the DEL, a strategic development that signals a deeper interdepartmental commitment to tackling joblessness, poverty and inequalities amongst the youth. Phase V aims to place thousands of Education Assistants and General School Assistants in public schools, delivering a dual impact: work experience for unemployed youth and much-needed support for under-resourced schools.  The programme should be used to protect the teaching and learning time, whereby assistants should be deployed to perform the administrative tasks freeing teachers to focus on teaching and learning in class. One of the most promising developments in Phase V of the BEEI is the allocation of funds specifically for exit opportunities for participating youth. This marks a critical shift in the initiative from being merely a temporary job placement programme to becoming a strategic springboard for longer-term employment or further learning”.

The DBE’s BEEI team, accompanied by officials from the Gauteng Department of Education and the North West Department of Education, visited the Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator offices on 25 April 2025. They toured the SA Youth Contact Centre, where over 365,000 interactions have been managed since the launch on 22 April 2025. These interactions included calls from young people seeking help with resetting passwords, logging into their SA Youth profiles, and step-by-step guidance on how to apply for opportunities. There are also inbound calls from youth in rural and peri-urban areas, aiming to ensure that no young person is left behind.