SACMEQ: Motshekga must answer for misleading of Parliament

15 September 2016

Evidence has emerged that the Department of Basic Education knowingly misled Parliament this week when it claimed that the Southern and Eastern Africa Consortium for Monitoring Educational Quality (SACMEQ) IV report had shown an improvement in learner performance.

New information has come to light indicating that there is no scientific basis for the Department to claim an improvement in learner performance. This is due to the non-comparability of results between SACMEQ III and SACMEQ IV.

In a blog post published yesterday, education researcher Nic Spaull revealed that he resigned as a consultant to SACMEQ because the SACMEQ Secretariat had refused to deal with concerns he raised over the “comparability and validity of the findings.” 

Spaull claims that the non-comparability of results was due to (a) different methodologies used in calculating the test scores for SACMEQ III and IV, and (b) the exclusion of weaker learners from the final results of SACMEQ IV.

This explains the anomaly the DA identified when the SACMEQ data was presented on Tuesday: the reported improvement in learner performance and simultaneous decline in teaching performance. 

Indeed, it now appears that there may have been no improvement in learner performance at all, due to weak learners being excluded from the final SACMEQ IV results.

The Department of Basic Education was quick to claim in Parliament on Tuesday that the SACMEQ data showed “a notable improvement in the overall reading and mathematics scores of learners.” This led the Committee Chairperson, Nomalungelo Gina, to remark: “This really gladdens our hearts. It shows that the Department is really putting in the effort.”

It is concerning that the Department of Basic Education apparently knew that the SACMEQ III and IV data was non-comparable, but claimed an improvement anyway. As Nic Spaull wrote in his blog:

“The Department of Basic Education is already aware of all of my concerns since I emailed a number of members of the Department’s research team drawing attention to these problems and cautioning against publishing any results until they could be rectified. It would seem that the Department has chosen to push ahead and report these problematic results to Parliament in spite of these numerous concerns.”

Misleading Parliament is a serious matter. I have today written to the Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee, Ms. Nomulengelo Gina, requesting that Minister Motshekga be summoned before the Committee to explain what happened. I have also requested that Nic Spaull and a representative from the SACMEQ Secretariat be present so that we can get to the bottom of this.

Reports such as those produced by SACMEQ must be used as a means to assess the state of our education system, honestly and objectively. We would be doing the children of our country a disservice if we allowed such reports to be used as tools of political and bureaucratic manipulation. 

Issued by Gavin Davis, DA Shadow Minister of Basic Education, 15 September 2016