Frustrated parents line up outside Sharonlea Elementary School Wednesday morning to ask about their children’s placement status.
- Parents whose children still need placement are scrambling to find schools for them in Gauteng.
- Some gathered at Sharonlea Elementary School Wednesday morning to inquire about their children’s placement status.
- The placement of children away from home is one of the issues raised by many parents.
The last-minute school hunt continues to overburden Gauteng parents whose children still need to be placed.
Inland students returned to school on Wednesday to begin the 2023 academic year.
In Gauteng, around 290,751 students will be sitting behind a desk.
Unfortunately, 1,394 candidates will remain at home without knowing if they will attend school.
On Wednesday morning, frustrated parents lined up at Sharonlea Elementary School to inquire about their child’s placement status.
Queen Mokone, who got up early to line up with her niece, said she was frustrated with the online registration system because she was not familiar with it yet.
“This new registration process is different. It’s not working for us like the previous generation.
“We needed to be ready for the new registration system. No one is making enough noise about it.”
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Mokone said that in addition to needing to be better informed about the system, the cost of Internet access was worth considering.
“Many people do not have access to the Internet and not everyone can afford to go to an Internet cafe to register online.” she added.
As it is, Mokone, who is staying in Northriding, finds herself in limbo as she doesn’t know which school her niece will attend.
Her fear now is that her niece will be placed in a school that is far from where she lives.
“I stay in Northriding, which is close to the school and is the cheapest.
“I’m going to be paying for my niece’s school and transportation, and if they put me in a very remote area, it’s going to be too expensive because I have my own son and I have to think about him because he’s going to [creche].”
She said the placement issues could have been easily avoided if schools first looked at the students closest to them before looking at those outside the school’s radius, adding:
It’s not right, and nearby schools should consider kids from that area and those who are far away because it’s taking away from people who live in that area to use the facilities in that area.
A 35-year-old woman from Weltervreden Park said her son was placed in a school that was not her first choice.
This despite being one of the first to apply after online applications opened on July 22, 2021.
“When they opened the online applications, I was one of the few parents who applied early and my son was not assigned any of the options I took.
“They just took me and put me in Highlands North Boys High School, which was not my school of choice.
“I had selected King Edward VII School and Parktown Boys High School. I appealed and went through the process, but nothing was done,” she said.
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The woman, who also lined up at Sharonlea Elementary School, added that she was there to request that her son be placed in a school close to where they stayed because she did not want to have problems with transportation.
“I am here to find a school nearby because, as you know, transportation to take a child from one point to another is a problem. The closer, the better.
“Highlands North is not an option for me. School is not my choice,” he said.
Parents outside Sharonlea Elementary School on Wednesday asking about their child’s placement status.
Zandile Khumalo
Another woman from Alexandra added that her daughter attended a public school where half of her tuition was subsidized from grades 1 to 10.
“Now that I was about to move on to grade 11, I was told that the school was now private and that I would have to pay the full amount.
“I told them that I will not be able to pay the full amount because I do not have that amount of money.
“The principal then told me to go find another school because I won’t be able to pay.
“When I tried to find space, I had no luck because all the schools were full,” the woman said.
He added that when he met with the district to inquire, he was told that he should go to Sharonlea to resolve the matter.
