Conclusion

In her keynote address at the recent South African Teachers’ Union Symposium, the Minister of Basic Education stated that focus schools were no longer optional – they were powerful, innovative schools which would endow the youth with specialised skills and competitiveness. “If we don’t prioritise then we may as well forget about any new growth path or any better life for South Africans,” the Minister said.

The Department of Basic Education’s Action Plan, Towards the Realisation of Schooling 2025, shows that attention to focus schools is essential and raising the quality of focus schools is a requisite for economic development and dismantling inequalities.

Focus schools should contribute to the full personal development of the learners. Accordingly the HSRP aims to support those historic schools that wish to transform themselves into focus schools, thereby accelerating the growth of engineers, artisans, agriculturists, sportsmen and women, and performing artists in this country. With renewed signs of government interest and expressions of interest from the corporate sector, it is envisaged that the next five years will see the HSRP making a significant impact in the pilot schools and beyond. As it does this, the HSRP can draw inspiration and support from the many generations of alumni who graduated from the historic schools. It is our hope that in the future, through these and other new and exciting partnerships the historic schools will continue to produce leaders of many kinds and, among these, to be a source of teachers, academics and administrators who will make a difference in meeting the crying needs of education in our country.

Learners write examinations in the historic stone church at Tiger Kloof.