22 April 2025
Joint media statement: Constitutionality challenge of the learner admission policy of the Western Cape continues
#SofundaSonke
On Thursday, 24 April 2025, Equal Education (EE) and the Equal Education Law Centre (EELC) will once again challenge the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) at the Western Cape High Court, seeking systemic changes to the WCED’s admissions systems and procedures concerning late applications. Our specific focus in this part of the case is on the WCED’s policy failure to address late applications. We will be asking the court to declare the WCED’s failure to timeously place late applicant learners in schools unconstitutional and in violation of their rights to dignity and equality among others.
Over the past 10 years, it has been a reality for some children from disadvantaged communities in the Western Cape to have no access to school at the beginning of each school year. The Western Cape government is familiar with this systemic reality. The lack of available school places is particularly prevalent in the WCED’s Metro East Education district, which is a low-income district largely dominated by disadvantaged communities such as Khayelitsha and Kraaifontein. Many communities in the Metro East continue to struggle with poverty, unemployment, and crime. For children living in these conditions, education is a vital pathway to a better future. They cannot afford to be out of school, especially not as a result of government shortcomings.
Parents and caregivers who miss the admission application window of the preceding school year are often left in limbo, unsure of the process for handling their late applications, leading to their children being stuck at home for an indefinite period. Late applications for school places are informed by multiple factors, including parents having limited access to digital services and impromptu relocations from different provinces to the Western Cape due to factors such as unemployment, unexpected deaths or abuse. Despite having an understanding of this, the WCED continued to send parents from pillar to post when seeking school placement and as a result of this frustrating process, parents and caregivers continued to approach the EELC and EE for legal interventions. After years of unsuccessful engagements with the WCED, on 11 April 2024, the EELC, representing EE along with five parents, had to institute an urgent application for the immediate placement of the affected learners while simultaneously seeking relief to address the systemic failures of the Western Cape government to provide enough school places. This urgent application was the second urgent court application in the quest to obtain equal access for all in the Western Cape.
Due to the complexity and systemic nature of the issues raised by parents and caregivers in the Metro East, the application had to be brought in two parts, with Part A and B. In Part A of the application, we sought an order for the placement of all out-of-school late applicant learners in the Western Cape, as well as for remedial and support plans for these learners in an attempt to ensure they meet the academic requirements for 2024. We also asked that the Head of Department produce an investigative report on why the WCED has failed to place these learners. On 17 May 2024, Judge Nuku made an order compelling the WCED to provide school places for out-of-school learners who had applied late. The judgment was followed by Nuku J’s reportable reasons on 27 July 2024. Significantly, the reasons deemed it important to define what it means to “place” a learner and stressed that providing access to education and to schools does not end with simply indicating that a learner is placed but must include the WCED ensuring that the learner is physically attending school – it is then when true access is achieved.
Part of the takeaways that emerged as part of Part A included the following:
- The promulgation of Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) for the processing of late applications in the Western Cape, which took effect on 2 December 2024.
- The Western Cape government was ordered to put in place admission pop-up stations at Khayelitsha Mall, Somerset Crossing, Eerste River, Bloekombos Bloch Centre, and Kuils River from November 2024 to 1 February 2025.
While we welcomed the Western Cape government’s interim interventions, which were helpful for parents and affected learners, we note that they have not gone far enough to address the systemic challenges to the WCED’s admission systems and procedures for late applications and the lack of planning for timeous placement of late applicants. EE, represented by the EELC, is accordingly persisting with Part B of the application, which seeks to address the systemic realities faced by many learners who continue to miss out on school at the beginning of every school year in the Western Cape. Learners and parents simply cannot afford to have to bring a third court application in search of equality for all in the Western Cape!
Part B of the application, which will be heard on 24 April, will particularly focus on the WCED’s policy failure to address late applications and the extent to which its current policies and practices unfairly discriminate against late applicants based on race, poverty level, place of birth, and social origin. We are also asking the court to declare the WCED’s failure to timeously place late applicant learners in schools unconstitutional, and as a result, that the WCED’s admission policy and some of the WCED’s admission policy circulars be set aside to the extent that they permit late applicants to remain unplaced for an indefinite period, with no clarity on the way forward.
We have continued to monitor the interim measures put in place by the Western Cape government and they have thus far not been successful in eradicating the systemic reality of the lack of school places. We continue to see learners without school places and without adequate support as they wait for placement in the Western Cape. A success for Part B will address the complexities and nuances of the long-standing systemic reality of inequality and lack of planning for late applications in the province. The right to education contained in the Constitution should be immediately realisable for ALL learners. Providing school places for a large number of learners and leaving others behind (no matter how small this proportion of learners is) does not constitute fulfilment of the right. Admission policies and practices such as those of the WCED, which unfairly discriminate against the most vulnerable and poorest within the Western Cape, cannot continue to be defensible! #SofundaSonke!
[END]
To arrange a media interview, contact:
- Jay-Dee Booysen (Equal Education Law Centre Media and Communications Specialist) jay-dee@eelawcentre.org.za or 082 924 1352
- Ayanda Sishi Wigzell (Equal Education Communications Manager) ayanda@equaleducation.org.za or 076 879 3017
CALL TO ACTION
Join Equal Education and the Equal Education Law Centre in our call for school places for all learners in the Western Cape by engaging with, liking and resharing our content on social media with the hashtag #SofundaSonke.
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