Western Cape Education on successes of SWD@Schools project

During the bi-annual Premier’s Council of Skills (PCS) today, the Western Cape Government and key stakeholders met to unpack the initiatives undertaken by the PCS to identify and address gaps in the market and ensure that more young people have workplace opportunities.

Among those successes is the SWD@Schools(link sends e-mail) project which has seen 94.6% of participating Grade 10-12 learners receive placements in the ICT sector between 2019 and 2021.

Premier Winde said: “The purpose of the PCS is to reduce the gap between job seekers’ skills supply and our major industries’ skills demand, to address youth unemployment. This is even more important in the context of the job losses that we have experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic. We know we have to do more, and ensuring the economy has the skills it needs to grow is an important part of this.”

Among the initiatives which PCS are supporting to address the industry-learner skill gap is the SWD@Schools(link sends e-mail) programme. Between 2019 and 2021, the Western Cape Education Department or WCED and Department of Economic Development and Tourism or DEDAT worked together to roll out the SWD@Schools(link sends e-mail) project in partnership with Oracle SA. The purpose of the programme is to upskill Grade 10 to 12s with recognized ICT certification and drive educator development.

During the programme, learners were taught the fundamentals of Java, a coding language, to fast track their development and workplace exposure to address industry skill needs.

The programme accommodated a total of 359 learners. Of which, 188 transitioned from the participating schools to the post-school training model. In total, 94.6% of learners exiting the programme went into industry placements in positions including web development, junior software development, engineering, consulting, data stewardship, and SAP consulting.

Premier Winde said: “We have learnt a lot from this programme and going forward, we need to look at how we can make the school ICT curriculum more robust. The use of Java and embedding it in the curriculum, rather than as an extra-curricular activity, is critical and we must lobby for this once again.”

The Western Cape Government’s focus on improving learners’ ICT skills is supported by our expanded focus on Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics, Agriculture and Coding or STEAMAC.

Provincial Minister of Education, Debbie Schäfer said: “While STEM subjects remain critically important, we have expanded our focus already since the previous term of office, to include other fields identified as being important to our provincial and national economy. Arts, Agriculture, and Coding and Computational Skills are just as important for our learners’ economic prospects. Our strategic priority is to expand learning opportunities in all of the STEAMAC fields.”

Minister Schäfer added: “For example, we are expanding access to agricultural subjects through the establishment of workshops for these subjects, and the provision of tools, machines and equipment to schools that offer agricultural subjects. Despite our dire financial constraints, eleven additional schools in the province are offering agricultural subjects from this year, bringing the total number of schools in the province with this offering to 29.”

The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) is ensuring the implementation of STEAMAC through its continued focus on addressing technical and vocational skills by 2024. This includes:

Adopting a new strategic intent to increase access, learner enrolment and performance in Technical, Agriculture and Vocational education in the WCED from 6% to 12% by the end of 2024;

Strengthening the skills supply pipeline, in line with career pathways aligned to technical skills required by industry in the provincial economy;

Increasing access to vocational and occupational subjects; and

Shifting the current 96% academic and 4% technical focus to 60% technical or vocational and 40% academic.

Between 2019 and 2021, the Western Cape Government has spent over R72 billion on youth development, including skills training, e-learning, internships, bursaries, infrastructure, education opportunities, early childhood development and child protection service.

The Provincial Minister of Finance and Economic Opportunities, David Maynier said: “DEDAT, through their Skills Development Programme, will continue to support the WCED to drive a stronger interface between the education system and industry to address the skills mismatches facing the supply of a talent pipeline to industry. This will include strengthening collaborations with key partners including government, industry and key funding partners to leverage funding from funding partners like SETAs and other key funders in the skills ecosystem to co-fund towards increasing youth access to skills interventions and workplace experience.”

Premier Winde added: The focus of today’s PCS was to foster support from the public and private partners for the WCED’s target of increasing the number of skilled school leavers. It further aimed to facilitate public and private financial and non-financial support to drive the sustainability of WCED’s strategic model in the offering of more vocational and technical curriculum offerings at their identified focus schools, technical high schools, and Schools of Skills.”

Among those who attended today’s PCS were Ministers Schäfer and Maynier, as well key stakeholders from the BPO Industry, wholesale and retail, financial services, Chamber of Commerce, TVET and CET college representatives, Higher Education Institutions, private training institutions and public entities such as Wesgro, the Atlantis Special Economic Zone for Green Technology and the Saldanha Bay Industrial Development Zone.

Minister Maynier continued: “We encourage the pledge by industry present today to commit to partner with DEDAT and the WCED to strengthen the offerings at the schooling level, provide more opportunities for youth to access the right technical and vocational skills as well as the standard required by industry for our youth to transition into jobs. We’d like to thank all our partners present today and those not here today for helping us achieve these wins to support youth employment.”

Source: Government of South Africa