Some research I have come across paints a dire picture for education in South Africa, with "top achievers in maths and science" performing poorly or showing little interest in maths and science.
This is quite oxymoronical and I question whether the correct students are being asked...
This post is probably quite disjointed.
It is just a bit of nerdy venting. Perhaps some of it makes sense to you and perhaps you find a bit that you agree or disagree with.
Here, I will simply devote a short section to a phenomenon which occurs often, but is seldom identified and scrutinized with the necessary enthusiasm.
Few people, save an optimist (like me), argues with a research result which seems to affirm the accepted cynicism. South Africa, like many other countries, is filled with those who pounce upon any bit of negative information and use it to propagate their particular brand of gloom.
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| Some consider this a prophecy or a cautionary tale. I doubt the former and don't really take the latter to heart. |
They may be right, but the point I want to make is that we need to resist the urge to select information which agrees with our preconceived notions, and rather only listen to that which has substantial proof.
I recently attended a conference for Health Educationalists (people teaching health sciences), where a paper was presented, entitled, "Recruiting rural origin students to health sciences - a one year follow up of top achievers at rural high schools in South Africa".
The presentation was great and the aim was admirable. More such research is required and, more importantly, the issue needs to be addressed.
The abstract concludes that "a minority of top achieving rural high school students are able to access tertiary institutions in South Africa, but many of those that are successful do access financial aid".
The research also aimed to see how effective a "road show" open day might be. Apparently students more readily gather information on these issues from peers than from open days.
The issue, however, is that the article claims that its sample represents the "top achieving students", whereas the only proof for this is that they arrived at the open days and agreed to participate in the study.
No correlation was attempted with the region's National senior certificate achievement levels and it was accepted that very few students from this region succeed. This may be true, but I would have liked to see researchers confirm that a bit more independently.
It is very likely that the students that attended the open day were not, as they assumed, the top achievers in maths and science, but any students who were willing to attend. As a student, I often saw this happen - a few students are asked to attend (perhaps originally the top achievers), but if these decline, any other students willing to go are sent in their stead.
This happens readily and makes the claim of "top achievers" dubious.
I am willing to accept that these might be the elusive stars of their classes, but will require a bit more persuading.
On a similar note, I recently learned of a survey in the Stellenbosch area of the Western Cape, South Africa, which also polled 40 "top achievers" in maths and science and established their career plans consisted of "having babies" after finishing school and that they would not continue with science as a subject because they "[didn't] like reading".
These scandalous results become the highlight of dinner conversation, confirming the damning suspicions of pessimists, but no-one asks how these "top achievers" were recruited. Once again, it was left to the discretion of the region's schools to send their most promising students. One researcher admitted that she knew of a top student who had declined to attend.
Admittedly this doesn't prove anything, but should at least force one to scrutinize your sample a bit more closely.
We can accept that the situation is as bad as it seems, that top students from certain schools only want to procreate and have an aversion to reading, but only if we are sure that these are top students.
I'm quite certain that a carelessly selected group of students from
any high school might yield similar results if the correct (or incorrect) students are interviewed.
In conclusion, I think everyone needs to be a bit more critical of the information we hear and propagate and, where possible, ask a few detailed questions to establish how robust or flimsy a claim based on research may be.
