I wish to challenge Section27's narrow and sensationalist view of the issue of the Gauteng Department of Education v School Governing Bodies. I attended the court hearing but I don't intend to comment on the merits of the case but rather put forward a view from the tenches. Both of my children attended government schools for their entire schooling and I spent 13 years on governing bodies.
The impression given in much of the argument in court was that it was a noble battle between the provision of education nationally and the overreach of SGBs. The further impression given is that it is a matter of clarifying the balancing act that the principal has to perform in advancing the admission policy as devised by the SGB, and managing the practical application process on behalf of the Gauteng Department and Education as its employee. It's not. It's actually a grubby war between the changing and unplanned exigencies of an incompetent but overstretched GDE, and SGBs trying to hold schools together.
Gauteng has a greater and greater influx of schoolchildren every year. This is due to a myriad of factors. Many are the children of economic migrants. Many have been sent to Gauteng for a better education than that available in other provinces. Many are the result of the changing of provincial boundaries.
The tension between the GDE and SGBs is not a result of carefully honed legislation and regulation. It is a clash between legislation and hastily crafted and ever changing regulations to accommodate repeatedly changing conditions. This is what has placed principals in the impossible position of having, in effect, two masters.
SECTION27 and its followers say "The Constitutional Court's decision in the Rivonia case is a crucial one for the future of equal access to education in SA. It will have an impact on learners and communities throughout South Africa. It will determine who has the final say in how many learners attend a school, what language they will be taught in and who will be excluded from a school on the basis of an SGB's admission and language policies."
The reason that this situation exists is because the government legislated it. When the South African Schools Act came into force in the '90s the government gave SGBs significant powers because the government saw them as fulfilling two roles: as a serious opportunity for democratic participation at community level. Pragmatically it also saw that if SGBs could run schools effectively and with the contribution of school fees by parents, this would take some of the burden off the State to concentrate on really poor communities.