I know this isn't either distance education or tertiary education, but since the subject of the South African educational system comes up here from time to time, I thought I'd post this positive article in the London Telegraph about South African boarding schools. Of particular interest is the description that educational standards in South Africa have been rising since the end of Apartheid. -=Steve=-
Indeed. From the article: ...good South African schools offer an admirable all-round education. Indeed, in some fields, they are better than all but a handful of British schools. [...] A few years ago, a big reason for not going to a South African boarding school from abroad was that direct entry into a British university was virtually impossible. The South African "matric" was regarded as roughly equivalent to what is now the AS-level, ie the standard one should reach at the end of the lower sixth year. Even a good three-year degree from a South African university would count as only one year of a British undergraduate degree. It is very different now. Whether it is because the standard of A-level has fallen or the standard of the matric has risen, the fact is that a student with an A or B aggregate in the latter - especially the one administered by the Independent Exam Board - may confidently expect offers from the best British universities, even in the most over-subscribed courses, and even if he or she is not going to be treated as an overseas student paying full tuition fees. Interesting.
Driver went to UCT, though a few years before I did. He was considered something of a leftist (and hence exiled). It occurs to me that someone considered a leftist in apartheid South Africa might be considered conservative elsewhere! I went to a boarding school -- though not in South Africa but next door in what was then called Rhodesia (this was about the time the name changed from Southern Rhodesia to simply Rhodesia). We took Oxford & Cambridge A-levels, and were very scornful of the South African matric. In any case, this made life easy for me when I first went to UCT -- e.g. I had at that point completed 3 years of calculus whereas my South African peers generally had done none. I hear complaints from South Africans that matric is not as rigorous as it once was -- echoing the complaints one hears about modern A levels. I don't know whether the article is accurate. It's a little misleading in referring to Driver as a headmaster for 23 years without noting that he was a headmaster in Hong Kong and in England (Wellington College) not in South Africa (where he was prohibited by the government).
There continue to be some substantial problems with the matric as is evidenced by frequent news articles. Oxpeckers experience continues to be the closest history available to this forum regarding education in this region. I hope he continues to post his comments. Jack
