Teen pregnancy, drugs blamed for high failure rate at Groot Aub

The principal of Groot Aub Secondary School, Isak de Groot, has said he is disappointed in the high failure rate amongst Grade 11 learners in the 2023 examinations at the school.

De Groot in a recent interview with Nampa said out of 45 learners in Grade 11 last year, only three qualified for the Advanced Subsidiary (AS) levels and only six learners qualified for tertiary education.

“We are not happy at all with the results. Our school is a farm school, the biggest problem we have is drug abuse, a child would be sitting in class high, under the influence of drugs. Our absenteeism rate is also high, as is the teenage pregnancy rate. This is a very big problem for us,” De Groot said.

He noted that most learners are also vulnerable and live with their grandparents.

“All these are contributing factors to the high failure rate,” De Groot stated.

He further said the majority of learners who failed were transferred to higher grades since Grade 8 despite poor performance.

“The majority of them also repeated Grade 10, were transferred eventually and still failed. This is another reason why we are sitting with a high failure rate. We are, however, trying our best. We have strategies in place now. I can assure you that our current Grade 11s will not fail as much, as they were also not affected by Covid-19. Come next year, you will see how we have improved our results. Our current Grade 11 learners have been with us from Grade 9. We have been talking to them, 2024 is our year. They are ready, they know what is expected from them,” De Groot added.

He further said discussions were had with teachers who had high failures.
“We also do not want to demoralise them. Some of our teachers joined us for the first time and do not have experience. We also assist them. We do not want to put too much pressure on them,” De Groot said.

Meanwhile, Khomas Education Director Paulus Nghikembua said the directorate is busy identifying strategies to improve examination results. Nghikembua told Nampa they are enforcing a monitoring and evaluation system that also includes general school leadership.

“We are also busy identifying gaps and looking at ways to improve our teaching methodology. In addition, we will train our teachers to enhance their teaching abilities and skills,” he said.
(NAMPA)
EB/AS/EK
(NAMPA)