Equal Education Rejects DOE's claim that school libraries are "unattainable" Press Release
Press Release: For immediate widest possible distribution
Response to DoE’s comment on school libraries
17 December 2009
Equal Education (EE) strongly rejects and condemns the recent
claim by the Department of Education (DoE) that providing decent
functional school libraries is “unattainable”. This is a denial of the
right to basic education to which every person is entitled, and a
violation of the rights to equality and human dignity. EE calls on
Minister of Basic Education Angie Motshekga to distance herself, and
the DoE, from this statement.
Ms. Hope Mokgatlhe, DoE spokesperson, commented on 30 November 2009 in The Teacher, a supplement of the Mail & Guardian
that “A stand-alone library for every school would be unattainable,
given the historical neglect of this.” She also stated that “the
department has focused on trying to ensure access to resources in a
practical and implementable way. This involves creating and improving
classroom library collections, mobile libraries, resources for schools
in community libraries and stand-alone libraries that serve a cluster
of schools.”
The reality is this:
- Only 7% of public schools in South Africa have functional libraries of any kind. (DoE’s 2007 NEIMS Report.)
- These 7% of public schools that have libraries are the former model-C schools who are able to establish libraries and employ librarians through their own funds, collected through fees.
- Since 1997 the DoE has produced 6 drafts of a national school libraries policy. None have been adopted as official policy.
- The DoE offers no specialists school librarian posts. All posts are for teachers, and most schools cannot spare a teacher to run the library because of high learner:teacher ratios.
- The DoE closed its School Libraries Unit in 2002.
- In November 2008 the DoE published for comment ‘National Minimum Uniform Norms and Standards for School Infrastructure’ which, in tables 15 and 18 states that every large primary school and every large secondary school should have a library of 80m2. The regulations still remain unconfirmed by the Minister and therefore are of no assistance to teachers, learners or education planners.
EE has costed the provision of a functional library to every
single school in South Africa currently lacking a library. This
research will soon be publicly available. To build an 80m2 library in
all approximately 20,000 schools in need would cost significantly less
than the 10 World Cup stadiums. If a national roll-out of school
libraries was undertaken over a 10-year period including
infrastructure, materials, training of libraries, and salaries for
full-time library administrators, the annual cost over those ten years
would be only 1.5% of the DoE’s R139bn annual budget. After the first
ten years, once infrastructure, materials and training have been
provided, the cost would reduce to 0.9% of the DoE’s annual budget.
This is very affordable and not “unattainable”.
The comment by Ms Mokgatlhe on behalf of the DoE suggests that a
school-library is not a necessity, and can be achieved through other
mechanisms, such as “collections”, “mobile libraries”, and “community
libraries”. Firstly, EE would like to make clear that we do not have a
dogmatic approach and would welcome serious steps by the DoE. But as
yet, no policy and no plan exist. Secondly, the DoE should be cautioned
about short-cuts.
In response to Ms Mokgatlhe, Prof Genevieve Hart of the University
of the Western Cape (UWC), who sits of the Advisory Committee for EE’s
Campaign for School Libraries, and is regarded as one of South Africa’s
experts on school libraries, says the following:
“I fear that we are going to have to learn the lesson all over again that other countries (and sections of SA schooling) learned in the middle of the 20th century. Books spread across a school soon disappear from general sight or stay locked up. The materials being sent into schools are best placed in a library where they will be managed well and made accessible to those who need them. Computer rooms do not replace a library as they are in use for much of the day for computer lessons.”
Further, in regard to community libraries, EE would like to point
out that it is not good enough for the DoE to offload its
responsibilities onto the Department of Arts & Culture and
municipalities who provide public libraries. For the majority of
children in South Africa, these public libraries provide their only
access to books. There are no books in most homes, and children, from
the age of 7 – when they are supposed to learn to read – are expected
to travel large, often unsafe distances to access reading material in
public libraries. Further, anyone entering a township public library on
a weekday afternoon during the school term will find the place crammed
full, with young people queuing for hours to access books, computers
and photocopy machines. This can render the public library unusable for
the adult public, and also makes it difficult for young people to use
it as a quiet place for homework and exam preparations. Lastly, public
librarians, who do a sterling job, are not trained in terms of the
school curriculum.
In regard to the efforts Ms Mokgatlhe claims the DoE is making:
Has the DoE investigated what happens to library books when they arrive
in the schools? (According to the draft Norms and Standards for School
Infrastructure mentioned above, 80 percent of schools are “without
library stocks”.) What is their impact on the school? Does the DoE
have evidence that their claimed strategies can replace libraries?
Many former Model C schools make the decision every year to spend
their precious funds on libraries. This shows that when resources are
available, educators are quick to realise the benefit of a functioning
library. If the DoE asked teachers and learners across the country to
comment on their strategies to compensate for libraries, rather than
provide them, they would soon find that there is a huge demand for
libraries at all levels of schooling.
Professor Hart also states:
“Return on Investment (ROI) studies show that money spent on libraries is well spent – in terms of academic results and literacy levels. There are other benefits less easy to measure such as the stocks of social and intellectual capital a library builds in a school community. A library just adds value to all aspects of a school's life. The question should perhaps be ‘What are the costs to South Africa of NOT having school libraries?’”
EE has collected 20,000 signatures demanding a National Policy on
School Libraries. We will continue to campaign until this is in place.
The public is invited to join nationwide events on 21 March 2010
demanding One School, One Library, One Librarian.
~*~
Issued by: Lukhanyo Mangona
Head of Campaigns Department
Equal Education
0825958600