Thousands of children whose parents are expected to apply for school placement in the new year may have to wait until the end of the first term to be placed in the Western Cape, says Education MEC David Maynier.

He confirmed that schools in the province are already full and that they were faced with challenges including providing the infrastructure, teachers and the school resources needed given the expected increase in learner numbers.

As of December 4, the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) allocated 117 407 or 97% places of the learners for whom applications were received for Grade 1 and 8 for the 2025 school year.

Placement was in progress for 3 698 Grade 1 and 8 learners. In addition, from January 1, 2025, the department expects to receive extremely late admission applications for around 4 000 Grade 1 and 8 learners.

“We will work to place every learner for whom an application is received going forward, but we want to be clear that Western Cape schools are full, and we appeal for patience from parents submitting new applications as they may not be placed before the end of the first term in the 2025 school year.

“We understand that this is a stressful and anxious period for parents, and we are asking parents to work with us as we try to accommodate their children as soon as possible. We are exploring all available options to find a place for these learners for the start of the school year,” said Maynier.

He said they were building new schools and classrooms through the Rapid School Build programme with six new schools and 180 additional classrooms at existing schools scheduled to be completed by January.

“We aim to complete a further three new schools and 85 additional classrooms at existing schools by the end of March 2025. This brings the total to nine new schools and 265 additional classrooms for learners in the 2025 school year. We will also have to make provision for new schools, and for new classrooms, to have teachers, and we are considering all available options ahead of the 2025 school year,” Maynier added.

However, Parents for Equal Education SA (Peesa) founder Vanessa le Roux said: “This statement is very similar to last year’s one... which is why we will once again face the same crisis. In fact the crisis has been worsened because we lost more than 2 000 teachers in this province. They keep on complaining about the national government and pointing fingers but never take accountability from their side.

“They act as if this is the only province affected by budget cuts, other provinces are working with what they have.

There is a big difference in the treatment and resources of disadvantaged schools and those that are not. The challenge is not really about late applications, it is their failures which they are trying to cover up.”

GOOD Party secretary-general and MPL Brett Herron said they were concerned about the state of the WCED.

“The MEC for finance announced in her November MTBPS that the Education department projected 11 000 late learner registration and walk-ins. Thus the WCED were not unaware of the additional demand for education. The WCED is lurching from one crisis to the next. It is inconceivable that the WCED is determined to terminate 2407 teacher posts.”

Herron said it was impossible that WCED suddenly had a budget shortfall that did not exist when the department’s budget was adopted in March 2024 without a shortfall.

“It is a dereliction of duty that despite projecting 11 000 late registrations and January 2025 walk-ins they failed to prepare for this. All of this exposes an alarming indifference by the MEC and HOD. Leadership and management is required to resolve the crises but those at the top seem to have given up which is unacceptable. If its current political leadership and management are unable to find solutions then they should make way for those who can.”

Leader of the opposition Khalid Sayed accused Maynier of attempting to shift blame, rather than take responsibility for the department’s persistent inability to address the critical challenge.

“Despite repeated warnings and the clear urgency of this matter, the WCED continues to fall short in finding meaningful and lasting solutions. This failure exposes a deeper, systemic problem that mimics the education inequalities of apartheid, perpetuating vivid contradictions in the quality of education provided to black learners, African, Coloured, and Indian, especially those from the poor working-class communities.

“Meanwhile, predominantly white schools continue to enjoy better resources and opportunities, an outcome of policy choices and budget decisions by the DA government.

“These choices do not prioritise improving the quality of life or education for the black majority but rather aim to preserve the privileges of the white minority and maintain the status quo.”

Cape Times