Amid ongoing challenges and delays in finalising disbursements from the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS), President Cyril Ramaphosa has announced a transformative strategy aimed at overhauling South Africa’s higher education landscape. The new initiative emphasises a greater focus on Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) colleges, which are increasingly viewed as vital avenues for equipping young South Africans with essential marketable skills.
In conjunction with this announcement, Buti Manamela, the Deputy Minister of Higher Education, recently articulated the importance of a skills-development-oriented educational environment during the preliminary address before Ramaphosa's State of the Nation Address (SONA).
"I don't think we should be dreaming about taking people to Mars when we can't have our own plumbers, cobblers and seamstresses. Those are the kind of skills we want to focus on and skills that are in our TVET colleges," said Manamela.
He highlighted the need for young people to recognise the myriad opportunities available within the TVET sector, signalling a shift toward a more integrated approach that blends academic practice with vocational training.
Ramaphosa underscored this strategy during his recent address, stating, “This shift we are taking for our education and skills development seeks to combine the academic and skills-based training.”
He further urged the private sector to contribute by providing experiential training opportunities for youth, enhancing their readiness to enter the workforce.
This week, IOL reported that delays in funding disbursements, unresolved applications, and communication failures have left many students in precarious situations, unable to access necessities such as food and accommodation on time.
However, the scheme, on Thursday revealed that some of the challenges stem from landlords billing students deposit fees and top-up payments when they are not authorised to do so.
“NSFAS has been informed that there are some Accommodation Providers (Landlords) who require NSFAS funded students to pay a deposit or top-up payment in order to get access to the approved private accommodation.
“NSFAS reminds Accommodation Providers of the compulsory conditions as provided by the Standardised Fixed-Term Lease Agreement between the private accommodation providers and NSFAS funded students,” the fund said in a statement.
Ramaphosa lauded the Matric Class of 2024 for their great feat in achieving a record pass rate of 87.3%.
“We should all be proud of the class 2024 but our immediate focus is expanding Early child development through formalising existing ECD centres to ensure they have the facilities and training material for quality learning so they read for meaning in foundation phase and geared for success in the later years. To achieve this, we are going to implement mother tongue learning to improve literacy and numeracy," he stated.