Minister Angie Motshekga believes that more education stakeholders need to collaborate with Government in improving quality learning and teaching in schools. Minister Motshekga therefore facilitated an all-inclusive stakeholder meeting in Pretoria on 03 March 2017, to consolidate Quality Learning and Teaching Campaign (QLTC) strategies aimed at mobilising members of society to pledge their support to education. In attendance was the KwaZulu-Natal MEC for Education, Mr Mthandeni Dlungwana and Limpopo MEC for Education, Mr Ishmael Kgetjepe. The Minister referred, in particular, to the need for social partners to collaborate with the Department and play their respective roles in supporting schools towards the attainment of quality passes in gateway subjects such as Accounting, Mathematics and Physical Science.

Minister Motshekga mentioned that it is important to ensure that the QLTC is strengthened at all hierarchal levels, especially at school and local level. The QLTC has been mandated to co-ordinate several community programmes to encourage South Africans to support schools in curbing the spread of social ills such as bullying, teenage pregnancy and alcohol and drug abuse.  The National Development Plan (NDP) states the following on active community and parental participation in education: “The performance of learners improves when parents are actively involved and take interest in their children’s education. All stakeholders in our society have a role to play in achieving good educational outcomes that are responsive to community needs and our economic development.”

Minister Motshekga stated that, although the QLTC has done tremendous work in mobilising communities in the various provinces, more work still needs to be done to improve the level of literacy and numeracy in schools: “We should have a regular engagement with the communities to update them on the core issues of education requiring collaborative efforts of the sector as a whole. One other issue which should be given special attention is community protests and the vandalising of school property as they disrupt the schooling progress”.

The meeting therefore resolved that the QLTC should fast-track the development of a QLTC Early Warning System to pro-actively identify challenges at community level, and respond with targeted interventions before they escalate and negatively affect the delivery of quality education to avoid the reoccurrence of incidences such as the burning of schools in Vuwani in the Limpopo Province.