Briefing by the DBE on progress reports in respect to the teacher

vacancies

Portfolio committee – 28 May 2013

• Education Human Resource Planning Framework – purpose and objective;

• Trends in Education; and• Process for filling of posts.

2

Content

Education Human Resource Planning Framework

• The purpose of the Framework is to guide the development and management of policy for the provisioning, utilisation and employment conditions of teachers and support staff. It aims to guide efforts to provide the right quality and quantity of teachers and support staff, with the right qualifications and competencies, in the right positions, at the right time.

• It has a time period of 5 years.

Education Human Resource Planning Framework (Cont...)

• The objective of this Framework is to enable the education departments to meet the teacher and support staff human resource (HR) needs resulting from their strategic plans. Human resource planning is essential in order to ensure that an organisation’s human resources are capable of meeting its operational objectives.

Trends• Trends are monitored to help inform planning;• Trends up until 2011 are available, data for 2012 is

presently been analysed and will be ready in July 2013; and

• Trends show whether or not perceptions of the public on the provision of teachers to schools are true or not.

Demand for teachers• The demand for teachers in the system comes as a

result of both the growth in enrolment and the need to replace teachers who terminate from the system through various reasons or causes.

• Growth demand normally results from various factors which include growth in enrolments due to population growth, high repetition rates; policy changes such as lowering learner: teacher ratios, lowering class size, or promotion of access to sections of the population which were previously not part of the education system.

Demand for teachers (Cont...)• Replacement demand results from the loss of teachers

or attrition due to various causes. The main causes of attrition include resignation, death or mortality, discharge due to ill-health and retirement. Each cause requires careful analysis and may require specific policy responses. For instance high levels of resignations may point to problems in retention, whilst discharge due to ill-health may point to a general societal problem or lack of effective wellness programmes.

Attrition• Attrition rates or total terminations as a proportion of average teacher

establishment per year is reflected in the table below.• The estimated total attrition rate averaged 3.5% (approximately 13 000

educators) annually over the period 2007/08 to 2011/12. • Overall, South Africa’s attrition rates compare well with rates reported in

international studies funded by UNESCO and OECD on teacher attrition which found attrition in many countries to be ranging between 5% and 30% (Hunter et al, 2005).

Financial Year 2007/8 2008/9 2009/10 2010/11 2011/12

Total Terminations 13 417 11 903 13 041 12 309 14 988

Average teacher establishment over a year 366 000 371 000 383 359 384 838 389 148

Attrition rate 3.7% 3.2% 3.4% 3.2% 3.9%

Teacher supply• Managing teacher supply involves two important

factors: ensuring adequate supply of teachers with required skills

and other competencies at all times; and ensuring their optimal utilisation in an effective and

efficient manner.

Existing supply – Age distribution

Age distribution• Consistently high concentration around the 40-49 age

groups in the last five years. A positive side of this could be that we have highly experienced teachers.

• The steep ascent of the line from the 20-29 years to 40-49 years indicates a huge gap in numbers between the two age groups.

• Consistent decline in numbers in the age group 30-39 resulting in a steep ascent from the 20-29 to the 40-49 age group. This is clearly an indication of an ageing teacher workforce which will need replacement in future.

Qualification profile

Qualification profile• A provincial disaggregation shows that 85% of all REQV

10 educators are in KwaZulu-Natal.• Employment of unqualified teachers in high numbers

could point to a hidden shortage in that it suggests that the system cannot recruit suitably qualified educators.

• Future reports will delve deeper into the analysis of these aspects including factors such as subjects they are teaching, school level/phase and geographical areas.

Summary

.

Appointment of temporary educators

Temporary Teachers• It is widely recognized that there would always be a certain number of

temporary teachers in the system appointed to due to natural attrition. • Under normal circumstance the rate of temporary appointments must

be approximately equal to the attrition rate. • The fact that in 2011/12 the overall rate of employment of temporary

teachers averaged about 11% compared to 3.4% attrition rate, suggests that there are other factors that impact on the rate of permanent appointment of teachers.

• Measures of reducing the number of temporary teachers that are in place include, the efficient redeployment of excess teachers; frequent advertising of vacancies; conversions from temporary to permanent; the permanent appointment of teachers, including bursars; and recruitment of graduates (REQV 13) and assist them in acquiring a professional teacher qualification.

Funza Lushaka Graduates

PED

NOT YET

PLACED PLACED

UNPLACEABLE (REPEATING,

WRITING SUPPLEMENTA

RY ETC)TOTAL

ALLOCATED

REVISED NUMBER

FOR PLACEMENT

(EXCL. THOSE

REPEATING)

% PLACED (PLACED/REVISED

TOTAL)

EC 266 0 91 357 266 0%

FS 55 156 54 265 211 74%

GP 98 365 193 656 463 79%

KZN 160 860 34 1054 1020 84%

LP 69 141 36 246 210 67%

MP 54 71 24 149 125 57%

NC 8 74 15 97 82 90%

NW 9 80 8 97 89 90%

WC 308 279 77 664 587 48%

NATIONAL 1027 2026 532 3585 3053 66%

Funza Lushaka Graduates (Cont..)The success rate of placement of Funza Lushakagraduates has improved over the years.

IMPACT OF FUNZA LUSHAKA GRADUATES ON THE FILLING OF VACANCIES

19

ProvinceVacancies as at 28 February 2013

Number of Funza Lushaka Graduates placed as at 31 March 2013

EC 5454 0

FS 812 156

GP 1279 365

KZN 2212 860

LP 2512 141

MP 2940 71

NC 953 74

NW 1499 80

WC 1328 279

Grand Total 18989 2026

Foreign educators• PEDs appoint foreign educators to address the shortage specifically in scarce skills

subjects.• Given that the majority of the foreign educators were employed in terms of the

quota permit system specifically to teach Mathematics Science and Technology, it is clear there are shortages of local educators qualified to teach these subjects.

Province Number of Foreign Educators % increase since

December 2008 As at

December

2008

As at

September

2009

As at February

2010

As at June

2011

Eastern Cape 802 1065 1138 975 22%

Free State 28 37 39 32 14%

Gauteng 638 1194 1183 1286 102%

KwaZulu-Natal 391 529 495 709 81%

Limpopo Province 347 743 618 934 169%

Mpumalanga 295 629 382 567 92%

North West 279 311 321 458 64%

Northern Cape 45 65 63 77 71%

Western Cape 32 188 529 133 316%

Total 2857 4761 4768 5455 91%

Process for filling vacant posts• Posts are declared at the end of September of each

academic year.• Educators, including Deputy Principals and Heads of

Department, are identified in schools that are in excess of posts.

• PEDs fill vacancies firstly with the above mentioned employees and with Funza Lushaka graduates which normally takes the first quarter of the new academic year.

• For the remaining vacancies for teachers they can opt to use section 68(A) of the EEA to convert their temporary teachers to permanent .

Process for filling vacant posts (Cont...)

• Vacancy lists for entry level teachers are therefore scarce since the above processes can first be exhausted.

• For promotional posts once redeployment has been completed, a vacancy list is published in the second and last quarter and filled the first and third quarter.

• Through proper planning, which the Education Human Resource Planning Framework and the strategy around recruitment and placement of educators addresses, PEDs can forecast exiting of the system (retirement) and ensure that posts are filled in advance of a teacher leaving the system.

THANK YOU