General household survey - Statistics South Africa

Statistics South Africa 10
P0318
The most important problems experienced by those currently enrolled at educational institutions are
presented in Table 4. Nationally, a lack of books (6,1%) and high tuition fees (5,8%) were singled out as
the most important problems, followed by large class sizes (4,9%). In North West, 11,4% of learners
complained about a lack of books.
Table 4: Nature of the problems experienced at educational institutions per province, 2011
Problems
experienced in
school
Western
Cape
Eastern Cape
Northern
Cape
Free State
KwaZulu-
Natal
Province
Lack of books 4,4 6,4 5,6 5,1 6,9 11,4 5,7 5,8 4,1 6,1
Poor teaching 2,9 1,1 3,7 2,1 3,9 2,8 4,1 1,9 1,7 2,8
Lack of teachers 2,4 1,4 3,0 2,3 3,4 2,9 3,4 1,9 1,8 2,6
Facilities bad 2,6 4,2 8,6 3,0 6,9 3,8 4,0 3,2 2,1 4,3
Fees too high 7,3 5,2 3,9 5,6 5,2 5,5 8,8 7,3 2,0 5,8
Classes too large 7,1 2,5 3,6 3,0 6,1 7,1 5,6 2,6 4,3 4,9
Teachers absent 3,4 1,1 4,0 3,0 3,5 3,6 3,6 1,9 1,5 2,8
Teachers strike 1,0 0,5 2,0 2,3 2,8 0,8 2,4 2,2 1,1 1,8
4.4 School attendance
More than 14 million learners were attending school in 2011. Most of these learners attended schools in
KwaZulu-Natal (23,6%) and Gauteng (16,1%). Although about 6% of learners attended private schools,
large variations exist between provinces. While 8,1% of learners in Western Cape and 14,5% of learners in
Gauteng attended private schools, only 2,6% of learners in Northern Cape and 3,2% of learners in Limpopo
attended these institutions.
Little variation was observed in terms of transport used to travel to school. Three-quarters (77,5%) of the
learners walked to school, whilst a further 2,7% used private vehicles. Another 9,1% travelled to school by
taxi or minibus taxi. Almost three-quarters of learners (73,7%) needed 30 minutes or less to get to school.
Most learners (81,5%) attended the nearest institution of its kind.
Almost two-thirds (60,8%) of all learners did not pay school fees. Of these, 96,5% attended no-fee schools.
Only 5,9% of scholars benefited from fee reductions or partial bursaries in 2011.
Figure 5 presents the percentage of individuals attending public schools and who benefited from a school
nutrition programme. Almost three-quarters (74,2%) of learners who attended public schools where food
aid is provided, benefited from this. This percentage has grown significantly since 2009 when the figures
stood at 66,2%. Learners in Limpopo (94,7%), Northern Cape (86,7%) and Eastern Cape (84,6%) were the
most likely to benefit from this programme while learners in Gauteng (46,8%) and Western Cape (52,0%)
were less likely to benefit from the same programme.
Figure 6 shows that 17,2% of learners experienced corporal punishment at school. Corporal punishment
was most common in Eastern Cape (30,2%), KwaZulu-Natal (22,5%) and Free State (22,1%) and least
likely to occur in Western Cape where it was reported for only 3,7% of learners. Despite declines in
Northern Cape, North West and Gauteng, the percentage of learners who experienced corporal
punishment at school has increased nationally. Sharp increases from 2010 are particularly noticeable in
Limpopo (8,6% to 19,3% ) and Eastern Cape (23,3% to 30,2%).
North West
Gauteng
Mpumalanga
Limpopo
South Africa
General Household Survey, July 2011