The principals need to get down to business

No-one who has not actually been tasked with drawing up the timetable in a high school knows how difficult a job it can be.

There are computer programmes that will do it for you these days, but back in the early 1990s when it was my job, as part of a small team, to balance the conflicting demands and requests of those who would be teaching the classes the next year, there was no effective electronic way of making everything fit in.

We were battling away manfully in the November heat one year with our metal board and little magnetic counters, when our esteemed leader, the school principal popped in and dropped a bombshell.

The school was lucky, he told us, to secure the services of a 1^st rate maths teacher for the following year. She had produced stellar results at one of the private schools before giving up to start a family.

Now she was prepared to return to the classroom, but there were conditions attached. She insisted on a four-day week – Thursday was market day – and she had to be finished by 1pm every day so that she could do the afternoon school run.

He agreed. Nothing, not even our, then, respectable 1^st team rugby results, he told us, was more important than a 100% pass rate in mathematics, and a healthy crop of distinctions.

Imagine the size of the spanner that threw into the half completed works of our timetable in progress!

It wasn’t an invitation to a debate either, the man – and he was the best principal I ever worked for – didn’t operate that way.

So, we swept the board clean and started from scratch. The added restrictions meant that it took twice as long to do the job that year, but the maths results in the next, and for as long as that particular teacher was at the school, were among the best in the province.

That was in the bad old days, of course. The school was better resourced than the vast majority of schools in the land and the parents of those matrics were willing, and able, to fork out the extra cash needed to bring that brilliant teacher in.

Schools like that are still producing 100% pass rates, and raking in the As. They are living the unequal legacy, I know, but they also have that kind of leadership in charge of them.

The principal, if you think about it, managed the situation in text book business leadership/management fashion. He identified the problem; assigned it top priority; formulated a solution; found the resources to fund it; and motivated his team to implement it.

And it worked! Mrs Maths-whiz wouldn’t have lasted long if she didn’t produce the goods.

Now, 25 years on, we read how the country lies second from last on international rankings of school maths performance (and that’s factoring in the world class results of the top schools) and 22 years after the introduction of the new education department there has been no improvement.

In the wake of the release of the matric results last week I read several articles indicating that things are actually a lot worse than they have been presented to be.

One or two dealt with the continued poor performance in maths. One in particular, on the Daily Maverick site asks the question: “School maths: what is our story?

https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2017-01-08-school-maths-what-is-our-story/#.WHMm_KAjrrB.email

It’s an excellent analysis of what’s wrong with the teaching of maths in our schools, and it points out that there also one or two positive signs.

It got me thinking about my days in education, and the lengths my principal went to in that particular case to ensure that our maths teaching was top-notch.

And it occurred to that that’s what’s missing in the analysis I was reading – the role of effective leadership in solving the maths crisis.

My boss that year had no business training that I know of, but he tackled the problem along business lines. There would have been successful businessmen and women aplenty on the school’s governing body and perhaps he was advised by them. He certainly got their buy-in for his plan.

The principals of the vast majority of our schools don’t have that kind of experience and expertise to call on. They are very much on their own and no amount of explaining the downfall of maths teaching in terms of unqualified teachers; over-focus on grade 12 to the detriment of the foundation phases; and interference by the unions is going to help them come up with innovative solutions.

So, if I were to toss in my two cents worth, it would be to say let’s start with the principals. If the heads of those struggling schools could learn to approach problems in a business-like way like we did all those years ago, they would stand a better chance of solving them.

It won’t be easy, but it could make a difference quite quickly if we were to get the leadership of the schools going well, one at a time.

That would be a good place to start.

The talent drain is going to continue

After hearing Cindy Poluta struggle to explain exactly what a Kolpak contract was on 702 the other day I was glad to find a “primer” on the topic on Espn Cricinfo last week.

It gives the background to the special dispensation and explains how South African cricketers can work as European Union citizens in the UK because of a trade agreement we have with the EU.

Players from South Africa (among other countries) can, therefore, be contracted to county cricket sides without taking up one of their overseas player spots.

It’s been cozy, until Brexit came along and now it looks like it will all end soon.

It’s a thing right now because of Kyle Abbott’s and Rilee Rossouw’s imminent departure to join Hampshire as Kolpak players.

The article follows a question/answer format and it makes it all very clear. There is however, a bit if editorialising when it comes to explaining why an SA player would consider such a move.

Here’s what it says:

“But why would a member of the South Africa international team give up Test cricket?  - South African cricket has a quota system. In September last year, Cricket South Africa announced that a maximum of five white players can be picked in the eleven, on average. This means some white players, such as Kyle Abbott and Rilee Rossouw, may not get as many chances to play for South Africa and are hence choosing to move to England.”

Now, Abbott (Rossouw has been silent) is adamant that his decision has nothing to do with quotas. It’s about job security and, no doubt, the money. He sees himself as a fringe player, never certain of a starting spot in the Proteas team. Rossouw is certainly that.

Unsurprisingly, the social media has weighed in and, in the South Africa way, you have those who are loudly condemning the pair as sellouts who won’t be missed and who never really had transformation at heart; and you have those who equally stridently see them as trailblazers, leading an exodus of white players who have had the door shut on them.

How would I know what the truth is? I do, however believe that it lies somewhere in between. It’s a fact that there are now only five spots for white players in our national teams, and at the same time, yes, we need the buy-in and long-term commitment of white players if the, absolutely necessary, transformation of the game is to happen.

But I don’t think it’s been done properly. Saying, as they did last week, that there are still as many opportunities for white players as there have ever been, without explaining how that is, is just not good enough.

It’s wrong, of course, to use these two players as an illustration. They have both been given ample chances, white or not, and if they were better players they would be fixtures in the team – there are other whites who are.

No the real problems lie lower down. Not all of them are Kolpak players, some have British ancestry, but we are bleeding talented players at the under-19 level.

Keaton Jennings is the best-known current example. Gauteng’s Connor McKerr – the standout bowler in his generation is also gone, and don’t be shocked if one or two more leave as a result of last year’s SA Schools selections.

And why do we all act so surprised. It’s being going on for a while in rugby, to the extent that it’s become quite easy to pick a team of overseas players that would probably beat the Springboks (especially the 2016 lot).

It accelerated in the last two years as the quota of white players dwindled and the disturbing part is that it is young players going abroad now, not veterans looking for a final financial windfall to secure their post-rugby futures.

For my two cents worth, I’m with the doomsayers who believe the same is going to happen in cricket now, although I don’t agree that it will mean the demise of SA as a world power in the game. I don’t believe that’s the case with rugby either, the 2016 debacle notwithstanding.

Our school system is so strong, and there’s so much talent around that we will survive, and if those in control work out a way of doing things better we can even be the best in the world again.

Really develop the game, among all children in the country, and who is going to stop us?

You can read Espncrickonfo’s explanation of the Kolpak system at:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/story/1075718.html

We need leaders in our schools

So the IBE matric results were released on Friday and, no surprise, the posh schools all got 100% university entrance passes; their matrics averaged over two As apiece and there were so many who got seven, eight, nine, or even 10 distinctions, that those who earned an old-fashioned full house of six look like the most desperate bunch of under-achievers.

The announcement led, on a slow news day, to discussions on the phone-in radio shows and lead stories on the newscasts. I was in the car all day, so I heard most of them.

And, of course, I’ve got my two cents worth of opinion on the matter.

The obvious question was what the results from the state schools are going to look like when they become known next week, and from there it was a short step to asking the big one: Why is there such a chasm in achievement between the schools who released their results this week and those who will do so next?

I generalise of course: not all independent schools produce great results, and not all of them are well-resourced and expertly managed. And there are many state schools who have 100% pass rates, and who churn out top achievers, including some who operate under appallingly poor conditions.

In trying to unpack all of this the obvious place to start is at the chasm in resources. Some of those independent schools charge a million rand for five years’ worth of schooling, and they have parents who are willing and able to pay it.

They have the buildings, fields and facilities, and attract top teachers. So do the best of the state schools – former model C institutions that look like, and operate exactly as the best of the private schools do.

And when you speak about inequality, you are talking about our past. Uneven resourcing of education was the cornerstone of apartheid education and 22 years of democracy hasn’t dented that legacy.

The radio hosts and their callers spoke about what to do to close that gap and, understandably, they got nowhere.

It’s about money of course, and if anyone knew how to get rid of the inequalities then this, along with many other problems, will go away. But we don’t of course, and so people spoke of making the private schools reach out to the underperformers, lifting them, and of redistributing the good teachers (that’s one that Gauteng MEC Lesufi comes back to from time to time).

What no-one did – even though it’s the obvious thing – was talk about leadership.

What do the high performers, public and private have in common? They function – on every one of the 200-odd days in the school year. And they do so because school management insists on it.

In the case of the private (and many state schools) it’s easy. Principals are well qualified and well paid. They are assisted by councils or governing bodies made up of experts in various fields who are efficient and motivated, and they have the resources to put plans in place.

Getting everyone to do their jobs properly is not so difficult there – it’s what happens in successful organisations everywhere. But what happens in those under-performing schools? Who is the principal, and what does he or she do? There’s no money, and the teachers are demotivated and often incompetent. The support from the community and the governing body is often non-existent.

Under those circumstances getting teaching and learning to take place every day is not so easy, and looking at the results, it clearly isn’t happening.

Yet a number of schools who operate under those circumstances do produce extraordinary results. You’ll find, I’m sure, that at every one of them there is a leader, and a management team, that has risen above the challenges, and that insists on everyone doing their job – teaching children, every day.

Identifying that common factor is far easier than doing something about it. Clearly it’s the state’s job to do that. They have the taxpayers' money, and the education departments have the reach to get into every school. They aren’t doing the right things, though. The results show that, and the shocking statistic is that, of the 25 000 schools in the country, proper teaching and learning only happens at about 5 000 (and that includes the private schools).

So, those who care realise they have to do something about it themselves and aid projects in education have sprung up all over the place. I went to a conference a few years ago where, for three solid days, I heard about the wonderful things organisations were doing, and about the money that corporations were spending, trying to help.

Not that many of them seemed to have much lasting impact. As with much aid, many projects were short-term and unsustainable and impossible to scale up.

And few of them focused on leadership. I wondered at the time why the educational experts weren’t trying to replicate what was happening at those under-resourced schools that were doing well.

There are obviously those who are working on it. And the best of those, I’d wager, are looking at the principals. Find a way to get more of those effective, no-nonsense leaders into more schools and support them, and we will at least be making a start.

The educational authorities should be running in-service training for principals and, most importantly, induction and orientation programmes for new appointees.

They have other priorities, I know, and the scale of the problem is intimidating. That’s why I salute those aid programmes who have recognised that you have to have effective leaders, in every school, and are tackling the problem from that end.

The kids who achieved multiple distinctions worked hard for them – their privileged circumstances didn’t do it for them on their own. But they were at schools led by men and women who recognised that their job was to make it all possible. And they did their jobs.

Let’s get the leaders right, one school at a time – that’s my two cents worth.

We have to do this better

I have never denied the justification for, and the need for urgency in, the implementation of transformation in sport.

The playing fields were decidedly uneven in the past and that’s reflected in the race composition of representative teams. Those who run sport have to change that, and the mere passage of 22 years since the introduction of democracy was never going to do that on its own.

Action was needed, and it still needs to be taken. Positive, pro-active action – affirmative action.

What I have railed against at times when I’ve felt the need to toss in my two cents worth over the 20-odd years that I’ve been writing about this stuff, is the practice of enforcing race quotas on representative teams and then using the number of black faces in team pictures as an indication of the success of the process.

True affirmative action is about identifying potential and developing it. Quota-based selection is a political move.

Sure, creating role models is an important part of growing sport in areas where it has never been allowed to grow because of past injustices, but wouldn’t it be better if those black role models were there on their own merits, instead of being the manifestation of compliance issues.

The sports federations aren’t innocent in all of this. Enforced quotas shouldn’t still be an issue in 2016, and they wouldn’t be if proper affirmative action had been implemented much earlier on.

And racism, I’m afraid, still plays a role in selection. That’s why so many still see quotas as justifiable after all this time, and why they sometimes are.

I know it’s all a bit of an academic discussion – and it’s easy to say things like “if we have to lose matches now to ensure a more representative future, then so be it”. Or “if the odd deserving white player loses out, that’s nothing compared to the many deserving black players who never had a chance in the past.”

I’ve subscribed to those views in the past, and brought them up them in discussions to justify the current policies.

It’s not so easy, though, when one of those excluded white players has a face, and you are looking straight at it as he, after being named in the B team, stands there watching A team players who everyone present, including the selectors, I’d wager, know are not as good as he is, being called up to receive their caps.

That happened to me at the awards dinner at the conclusion of the Coca-Cola Khaya Majola Week on Tuesday, and I found my journalistic neutrality wither and die in the face of the anguish that child was clearly suffering,

OK, I’ve met the boy before – interviewed him and wrote about him – so I don’t hold a totally unbiased view. He’s a super kid, and a great cricketer who I am confident will go far in the game. He didn’t deserve what happened to him, just as those who lost out in the past, didn’t.

We managed to confront one of the selectors afterwards, who mumbled something about the balance of the team and told us to ask whose position was player in question directly contesting, but even my old blind friend on his galloping horse knew it was all about the racial composition of the team.

We have to do this better, because what happened in Bloemfontein on Tuesday night was neither sporting nor educational, which makes you wonder how the entire concept of selecting teams based on performances at a week like this can be justified at all.

It’s not an original story, but that’s my two cents worth on it, anyway.

Khaya Majola Week final day

It was decided by someone, somewhere, a few years ago that the Coca-Cola Khaya Majola Week should revert to being a festival, with no overall winner in the end.

That’s what it was for many years until, in 1995, it became a limited-overs knockout tournament, in two sections with cross-pool playoffs, semi-finals and a final, a winner’s trophy, and classification games all the way down to last position.

All the good reasons why they ran it that way then apparently disappeared and it was decreed that the week would follow the philosophy of Coca-Cola’s other youth interprovincial week, the rugby Craven Week – that there is no winner and that the two teams that play the best rugby (cricket, in this case) will meet in the so called “main game” on the final day of the week.

At the Craven Week, for years now, no-one is buying the friendly, no winners or losers line, and the victorious team in the main game is called the champion team, even in the SA Rugby press releases.

The same goes at this week, really. Gauteng were called the defending champions, coming in, and they will be going home having relinquished the title they have held for the past three years.

I’ve always rather liked the Corinthian spirit in sport, but even I have to confess that times have changed and that, these days, no-one’s really interested in a competition where there is no winner.

So, why not go all the way and bring back the cup? One reason, I suppose, is that the Khaya Majola Week features all thee formats of cricket: declaration games, T20s and 50-a-side limited overs.

That’s to let the players express themselves in different ways and it would be impossible to arrive at official finalists at the end of a mixed week like that.

Still, however they got there, and official or not, we have two new finalists this year in Free State and Northerns, and no-one who was here would argue that they don’t richly deserve to be in the big game today.

They were a joy to watch and they have some serious future stars in their ranks. Note down the names Schreuder, Van Tonder, De Swardt, Visser, Msiza. For my two cents worth, we are going to hear about them again in the years to come.

It’s the final day in Bloemfontein – I’m not staying for the often anticlimactic SA Schools game tomorrow – and I will leave with my view that the best tournaments of this type are always held in the smaller centres very much intact.

On day 3 at the Khaya Majola Week

It was Nat minister Piet Koornhof who was reputed to have said, “those are my principles, but if you don’t like them, I have others”.

I was reminded of that in Bloemfontein on Sunday while we were watching Boland play Western Province in a T20 game at the Coca-Cola Khaya Majola Week.

I noticed, well actually I already knew but checked the official brochure to make sure, that there were boys from the same school playing for both provinces on the field.

Yes, believe it or not: there were three players in the WP team who had Western Cape Sports School listed as the school they came from, and two in the Boland team who also hailed from there.

I noticed that we had officials from both provinces sheltering from the fierce Free Sate sun under the same shady tree we were, so I popped the not so innocent question “is it true, that boys from the same school play for different provinces down in the Western Cape?”

The response was illuminating, and might not have been as frank if the people involved in the ensuing discussion had realised that they were in the presence of most of the media contingent who are at the week this year.

Apart from the obvious animosity between the cricketing structures of the two provinces, which bubbled along underwater, and stuck its head up and out from time to time, it was clear that the imposition of the political Western Cape province on top of the Boland and Western Province cricket unions – both of them over 100 years old – has not been a smooth process.

What it has meant is that the official educational provincial boundaries are those of the Western Cape province, and the cricket unions don’t really exist as geographic entities.

So, it was short move (and, in education departmental terms, a legal one) to say, let’s allow our specialist sports school to supply players of colour to both unions.

And Cricket South Africa is clearly allowing it to happen because they want the talented young black African players they have identified to attend a school with a good coaching structure.

Because that’s what it is, it emerged from the discussion on Sunday. Both unions have placed talented players (black African players, in particular) on bursaries at the Western Cape sports school.

And while WP has 1^st choice (an issue that clearly does not sit well with the Boland guys) on the players at the school – it is in Cape Town, after all – each union is investing in players for its own future and can select them for weeks such as this one.

“It’s a special arrangement, one made specifically for the purpose of developing top cricketers of colour,” is how one of the officials described it.

I guess you can’t really knock an agreement that has been made with transformation and development in mind, but I’ve been sounding off on points of principle for a while now and if you allow boys to be chosen from schools outside of their province in one instance, how can you prohibit it in others?

It’s a bit like saying, “those are my principles, but if you don’t like them, I have others”.

Well, that’s my two cents worth, anyway.

Two days to go at the Coca-Cola Khaya Majola Week, and it’s been fabulous in Bloemfontein, as I knew it would be.

Khaya Majola Week Day 2

The second day of this Coca-Cola Khaya Majola Week will stick in my memory as the day when the form book was chucked out of the window and the tournament’s overwhelming favourites, Gauteng and Western Province were both beaten.

In Gauteng’s case, it was their first defeat at this week since the last game of the 2012 week in Potchefstroom when they went down to Western Province.

They were well beaten by Eastern Province on Saturday and the defeat proved a point that I’ve been making – an unbeaten team faces big psychological challenges in maintaining their winning run.

EP are always one of the top teams, but Gauteng, with their SA under-19 players, and the current man of the moment, Wiaan Mulder, in their ranks, were firmly expected to win.

But they still had to go out and win it. Their bowling and fielding was not great – they let EP get to 226 – and then their top order collapsed and only Mitchell Van Buuren, with 70, made an impact with the bat.

So they lost for the first time in three years, although their chances of playing in the week’s prestigious main game haven’t altogether disappeared yet.

Western Province were Gauteng’s opponents in all those finals and they also came into the week with a crackerjack side and were expected to sail through. Their loss to Easterns on the second day proved another sporting point: no matter how good you are, your opponents still have every right to produce an excellent performance.

In this case, Easterns batsman Louis Oosthuizen hit a brilliant century, to help his side chase down a good WP total and there went WP’s chances of finishing unbeaten.

By lunchtime on day three, the fortunes of the two sides had taken very different routes. WP lost again – to their neighbours Boland, in a T20 game, while Gauteng bounced back by thrashing SWD by 117, with Wiaan Mulder smashing 104 off just 59 balls.

There should always be lessons to learn in sport and, for my two cents worth, the points to emerge out of this are: unbeaten runs always end; you don’t win games by simply turning up – your opponents are also there to play; and should you lose, there’s always the next game to redeem yourself in.

Gauteng did that, Western Province? Not so much.