Issues Influencing Black Learners’ Scholastic Experiences in ex-Model C Further Education and Training Schools

Abstract

Post-Apartheid education in South Africa is seemingly characterised by an open and accessible schooling system that paved the way for numerous ex-Model C (historically White) Further Education and Training (FET) schools to enrol huge numbers of Black learners and are therefore professing to practice multicultural education. Many of these schools are challenged to adapt their admission requirements, policies and curricula practices as a mechanism of supporting Black learners’ experiences. The question therefore is, whether these schools are indeed practising multicultural education or whether they merely assimilating Black learners into the established school systems. With this background in mind, the purpose of this study was to investigate issues influencing Black learners’ scholastic experiences in FET schools in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. A quantitative study was employed in selected ex-Model C schools, using a sample of 1037 Black learners. A key finding revealed that White educators lack the knowledge and skills to teach Black learners and seemingly do not cater for these learners’ life experiences and world view orientation. In direct bearing to the latter, it is recommended that educators in ex-Model C FET schools of the Northern Cape province, should be exposed to training interventions initiated by the Department of Education.