Being in matric is not easy; doing it in the middle of a pandemic is not for the fainthearted

For 17-year-old Abahle Sithole, it’s the little things that she misses about having a normal school life that make school less enjoyable now that there is Covid-19. 

“I miss hugging my friends and our long chats that do not involve us having to keep a safe distance,” she told Daily Maverick during a telephonic conversation. 

Sithole, a Grade 12 learner from Daveyton, Gauteng, used to spend her lunch breaks at school writing notes and revisiting challenging questions she might have encountered during class with the assistance of her friends and peers. 

But since she returned to school on 8 June, and with Covid-19 regulations in place, her home has become the only place where she can study outside of the school premises.  

“The one hour I’d spend studying during break time made a huge difference because sometimes you can’t do that at home. We are not even allowed to remain behind after school for our study group sessions; there is no teacher around at that time or anyone to monitor us,” she said. 

Educational psychologist and secretariat of the Society for Educational Psychology of South Africa, Kemoneilwe Metsing, said matric students are experiencing pressure that no one can understand.

“No one has ever been in their situation. A final year in high school is supposed to be fun, exciting, looking forward to the matric dance, the last sports scroll [achievement], that last sports game. These are all that these kids should be thinking about.” 

She points out that their learning patterns have had to change drastically, accompanied by “the pressure to perform well, not to disappoint their parents and themselves, [which is] another added anxiety, fear and pressure on to themselves”. 

In efforts to make up for teaching time lost during the school closures in March, the department of basic education cancelled the matric June examinations and pushed the final examinations to November. They are expected to run into December.

Phineas Khoza, another Grade 12 learner from Gauteng, can attest to this pressure. 

“We don’t spend enough time with teachers anymore. It’s worse when someone at school tests positive for the virus, there is added pressure because I have to rely on myself for everything,” he said. 

His school has closed three times since it reopened on 8 June after Covid-19 infections were detected. When he spoke to Daily Maverick on 15 July, Khoza was at home because of another disruption resulting from a positive case, and no indication of when he will return to school. 

Khoza is apprehensive about how his results, the key to his university entry to study law, will be affected at the end of the school year. 

“The disruptions slow down one’s learning pattern. I study at home, but having a teacher to guide me lessens the burden. It keeps me up at night not knowing what my marks will look like after all of this.” 

And, as Metsing explains, “Not all learners learn through the same mode. Some learners who are experiencing barriers to learning have succeeded in their studies because of lip-reading... with teachers wearing masks it becomes impossible for them to understand or hear what teachers are saying.” 

Education expert Professor Nicky Roberts says there are options that the department of basic education can explore for pupils whose learning is disrupted during this period.

“We could still move the final exams to later or use Grade 11 results as entry marks into university. There is a second-chance matric programme: if you fail matric, you can write again in May or June. So, we can have another round of matric exams halfway through to next year for those who have been significantly disrupted.”

She adds that Covid-19 has further widened the gap between no-fee and fee-paying schools.

With mounting calls from unions to have schools closed again ahead of SA’s Covid-19 peak, there are concerns about the detrimental effects a reclosure might have on children’s schooling and other equally important benefits such as the school nutrition programme.