college essay

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Introduction
Education is important as a tool to liberate oppressed people. During the decades of
South African apartheid, generations of black South Africans were suppressed, taught a different
curriculum than their white counterparts, and were educated in unfair societal roles. This created
a “self-fulfilling prophecy.” Blacks were educated as second-class citizens and therefore came to
act in the role of second-class citizens. Yet there was still hope for a better life, a life where
equality and representation in the government reflected the actual populace, and not just a white
minority. A key part of the white minority’s oppression was the control of black education. This
poses the question: How have the educational policies for black South African students changed
since the end of apartheid? The educational policies, specifically the Bantu Education Act of
1953, throughout apartheid and the differences between the educations of black and white
students is a large portion of South African history. This is a subject worth studying because
education is the key to a populace’s movement of the societal chain throughout every society.
Aitchison indicates that 33% of black South Africans, in comparison to only 1% of white South
Africans, are illiterate (year 1997, page 3). When education is increased, a populace succeeds.
When education is limited, a populace can face disenfranchisement and harm. Education is the
key to stabilizing a community and it provides a pathway for a populace to thrive. Education is
the key to freedom.
Within South Africa, it is incredibly important to look at the differences in education
between whites and blacks because these are two main populaces within a country that,
throughout history, were on opposite ends of a societal structure. There existed a white minority
who held all of the power against a black majority without power and who were treated
inhumanely. To gain this power, the white minority used education as a tool of oppression. By

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controlling the educational limits and content within black schools, the white minority was able
to limit the growth and strength of the black majority. By studying the differences between these
two populaces’ educations, one can study the trajectory of these communities. It is clear why
they act the way they do now, and it is important to see if there is a way to create an equal
footing for both communities. By studying the past, one can find a way to create an inclusive and
united South African community in which every person and their interests are represented and
accounted for.
Studying the educational reform in South Africa most assuredly contributes to the general
knowledge of South Africa. By studying the differences in education between blacks and whites,
it is clear how detrimental the apartheid was to black communities in South Africa. It is clear
why the minority was able to suppress the majority for so long. By studying these educational
differences one can see the cultural differences between these two communities, how they are
growing similarity post-apartheid. In understanding the United States, studying educational
reform in South Africa does not directly relate, but can create a bridge to the understanding of
Jim Crow laws. By studying another country’s racial segregation and educational
disenfranchisement, one can relate to the current state of education and the racial segregation
within educational systems throughout the world that, though not officially, still exist today.
Literature Review
The events of the apartheid are relatively recent and still affect the history and the
progress of education in South Africa. Many exploratory secondary sources have examined the
differences in education between the black and white populations in South Africa through a
variety of lenses. The legislative aspects are examined through the implementation of the Bantu

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Education Act of 1953 and the several other amendments that followed, the same amendments
that attempted to reconcile the great need for improved education for the black majority.
Many scholarly articles have been written about the apartheid and education, and
primarily the forced segregation laws mandated by the Bantu Education Act. The literature
proves that this act was extremely detrimental to the black populations often diminishing the
access to equal opportunities (Byrnes). It institutionalized racism in South Africa by creating
racially segregated educational facilities. The perspective of the education of black people was a
direct product of the white racism and elitism present in the South African populations. An
analysis by Wolpe offered that whites “are not oppressing blacks merely because they are racists
(which they may well be) but because they need them as non-competitive cheap labour”
(Christie, Pam, and Collins 61). This suggestion further proves the power struggle during the
apartheid. The access of power leads to potential oppression. The Bantu Education Act allowed
the white people to oppress the black people by “removing other groups either geographically or
culturally from themselves. To that effect, they need to control other groups” (Christie, Pam, and
Collins 59). The education for black students under this rule was to teach black students about
their tribes while simultaneously demonstrating the tribes’ lower statuses below the Nationalist
party and its followers (Christie, Pam, and Collins 60). This lower status was deemed by the
ruling whites to be of sound choice for the Bantu communities (Cross, Mungadi & Sepi Rouhani
176). The majority of the research done on the Bantu Education Act expands upon the
diminishing and destruction of all of the black students’ opportunities to break out of the
financial bracket that the Nationalist Party had determined. The Bantu Education Act ensured
that the Black students were groomed and prepared to fulfill the jobs designated for the black

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people: mainly factory and lower-income jobs that members of the Nationalist Party did not
want, leaving the black students at a great disadvantage in the separate education system.
Native South Africans showed resistance throughout apartheid. The Soweto uprising was
a series of protests in 1976 by high school students that led to large-scale riots and heightened
resistance. This uprising intensified the revolution against apartheid and increased pressure on
the South African government resulting in reforms under a democratic order in 1994 (Maile 98).
The updated Constitution acts from the 1990s provided new opportunities for Black
South Africans to attend previously white schools but still lacked in the idea of equal education
throughout races. Families from black townships either could not afford to send their children to
these other schools or did not have the means of transportation for them (Maile 99). In addition,
rural schools in townships still did not have the resources they needed to function as former
white schools did despite the new equality laws. Meanwhile,the parents who were financially
able to send their children to different and more qualified schools did (Maile 99).
Although apartheid and the Black Education Act officially ended in 1994, an official act
regarding South African schools and education was not introduced until 1996 . The South
African Schools Act of 1996 outlines the policies that would be put in place due to the change in
national views on racial inequality and segregation (South African Schools Act). The goal of this
act was to transition the country from its historical values of racial inequality and segregation
within education to a system free of discrimination that supports all students in South Africa in
their quest for knowledge (South African Schools Act).
The scholarly research establishes that reforms were made post-apartheid in order to
equalize the education system. As described in many sources, the need for equalization was
necessary and legislation was made to combat many of the funding and enrollment issues seen

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during the apartheid. With the actual legislation, such as the South African Schools Act of 1996,
stating that language will no longer allow races to be discriminated against, the intent is strong in
creating a more nurturing and supportive space for people of all languages. A comprehensive
view of these policies comments on their effectiveness and the enforcing of such ideas. The
evidence shows that change is occurring only at very slow paces demonstrating that the transition
is still occurring even decades later (Karlsson 332). Omnipresent corruption within the
government, a trait present in the Apartheid government as well, only enhanced the sluggish
nature of education reform (Lodge 403). The research has proven that with the current corruption
in the ruling body in South Africa, the focus on development and growth has been cast to the
wayside, disregarding the implementation of these laws. In addition, it takes more than a law to
change the societal perceptions of different peoples.
One of the larger changes, changing the representation of the schools, has resulted in an
attempt to involve more parents, but is still struggling with that aspect. Few parents are involved
with the governing of schools, and additionally, white, wealthier parents are raising the prices of
school fees in order to exclude the black parents and their ability to pay for their child’s
education. While in theory, parents of both races should be able to make the decision, the black
people are still at a great disadvantage (Karlsson). This is a brief example of the inequalities that
still exist. Throughout the readings, the discrepancies are still prominent and are named as
detrimental to the black South African students more so than the white students. With the lack of
enforcement outlined in these amendments, change is gradual, which is still detrimental to the
black students although apartheid has ended.
Hypothesis

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It is known that the quality of education affects the role that a person plays within the
United States. Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that because of the system of apartheid, the
same educational disparity that existed in pre-1960s of the United States, would be applicable in
South Africa. Therefore the hypothesis suggests that legislatively segregated education between
blacks and whites can lead to a disadvantage for black South Africans and an advantage to white
South Africans.
These advantages can be mostly seen tangibly in the economic stability of a populace and
that same populace’s standing socially. In using the term “socially,” one must be more specific.
In this case, “socially” means that one populace will have a lower position on the social chain.
This includes members of this group having poor housing, poor access to medical care, limited
access to technology, and holding low-paying jobs and lower positions in government, if any
positions at all. This disparity caused by education can be particularly seen within South Africa.
This exact hypothesis, stems from the legislative restriction on education, as seen within the
Bantu Education Act of 1953. The research will show that when the apartheid ended in 1994, the
effects were not immediate, but the social and economic positions of black South Africans
significantly increased in a positive manner.
Methodology
Upon arriving in South Africa, research will be completed surrounding our hypothesis.
Having greater access to primary sources will contribute to the analysis. Surveys constructed in
the form of interviews will delve deeper into the education systems during and after the
apartheid, as well as how the education system affects the equality of the races, specifically the
black and white South Africans. These surveys will include questions to the elderly, the students
who are currently in the school system: of primary, secondary and tertiary levels, local

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schoolteachers, and the professors of University of Cape Town. The appendix includes a list of
survey questions we intend to use for our research.
Analysis
The Bantu Education Act of 1953 mandated that black education would be separate and
unequal from white education. Inadequate school buildings, insufficient resources and overall
poor conditions further secured black South African students in the lower class of society. The
act institutionalized racism in South Africa by creating racially segregated educational facilities
and placing African education under the control of the National government. It served the
interest of the white supremacy and ensured that black Africans believed that their cultures were
of a lower order and that they should learn to prepare themselves for a white dominated society.
Financed and controlled under the Native Affairs Department, black education was directed
towards black culture and constructed around the black way of life. Schools are the fundamental
establishment in which the production of labor power takes place. The segregation in education
leads to segregation throughout all of society.
The Bantu Education Act, in its very design, was an unjust tool as a means to non-white
oppression in South Africa. This grossly unjust policy was designed by the Nationalist Party, a
political party of white-supremacist, Nazi-sympathetic Boers. An extension of previous attempts
to divide land by semi-autonomous tribal territory, the Bantu Education Act provided grossly
unequal education funds and quality to black students, with a curriculum intended to limit career
prospects to laboring for white business owners or unskilled work in the black townships. In
addition, schools became directly controlled by the state, effectively ending Missionary and other
various private institutions. The reasons behind it were simple; limiting intellectual development,

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career options, and possibilities of wealth development for blacks, racism and white supremacy
can be more easily enforced.
This racist legislation was extension of the rampant discrimination already present in
South Africa. British governance led to cultural inequality and poor quality of life in dirty,
crime-ridden townships. The population-majority blacks were already a societal minority for
centuries, but it was not until the Nationalists took control of the South African legislature in the
late 1940s that racism, especially in education, became the law of the land.
The Bantu Education Act was put into place in 1953 and was later renamed the Black
Education Act. Its main purpose was to separate Native South African Students from White
South African Students into different schools. Though this act affected all South African
students, as it defined which school they would attend, it mostly affected the black South
Africans since their schools did not have as many resources and used a different “culturally
appropriate” curriculum created by the apartheid government. They would be taught lessons
regarding racial hierarchy and skills for labor-based occupations. In addition to keeping students
separated by race, the act aimed to keep black South Africans from learning skills that would
allow them to be qualified for the jobs that they were unable to have according to the apartheid
government. Lessons taught them their “place” and how to live in “Bantu culture,” preventing
them from seeing anything different for their futures. Meanwhile, white schools empowered
students with skills to use in the white society created by apartheid. In black schools, class sizes
were much larger, there were less classrooms, very few materials and books were available, and
teachers were not qualified. The Bantu Education Act put black South Africans at an extreme
disadvantage until being repealed in 1979 by the Education and Training Act. Though there was

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an educational policy change, much of the racial segregation was still enforced. In 1994, at the
end of the apartheid, the Black Education Act was deemed unconstitutional.
The racist policies under the Bantu Education Act ended with the demise of apartheid.
Mandela’s South Africa led to a new and innovative constitution, one that deemed racially-
unequal education policies as unconstitutional. Native South Africans showed resistance to the
apartheid movement and the Bantu Education Act since it began, but large protests did not start
until later with the Soweto uprising discussed earlier.
The Constitution acts instilled in the 1990s, which repealed apartheid laws, put an end to
segregation of race in schools. This created fragmentation as students transferred between
schools. Although this allowed for more opportunities for black South Africans, many were still
unable to attend former Model C White schools and continued to receive unequal opportunities
due to the lack of resources at their facilities. This led to an education gap in socioeconomic
classes rather than strictly by race.
This legislation by the new government of South Africa was created to uniform public
education and combat the remnants of racism and inequality within education. This includes, but
is not limited to, the banning of corporal punishment against students (black, white or otherwise),
banning racial or language discrimination, and designing a national set of standards for the
education curriculum. The black-controlled, African National Congress (ANC)-led legislature,
paying heed to the horrors and mistakes of the formed Nationalist government, used their power
to design a public education system less-conductive to, although not entirely protected from,
widespread and culturally imbedded racism and racial inequality.

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The act states that admission to South African public schools must be free of
discrimination or any administered admission tests. Essentially, the criteria for entering a school
can only be based on the grades students are placed in based on age. The only time a school can
differ from this standard is if the Minister deems an underage student eligible based on all other
criteria to enter a school of a higher-grade level. This meant that students of mixed races would
attend the same public schools of the geographical area they live and have the same privileges
and resources within these schools.
Unfortunately, obstacles have come in the way of the dream of racial equality in schools.
When the country shifted from white-minority rule to universal suffrage in 1994, South Africa
became, for all intents and purposes, a new country, a development that is always difficult to
manage in the initial stages. In addition, the ANC, once heralded as the Nelson Mandela-led
movement that ended Apartheid, has become rife with corruption, political stagnation, and lack
of transparency; thus, the role that the ruling government partakes in the present and future of
South Africa, in education, sociological development, and beyond, has been increasingly coming
into question. Nevertheless, other situations come into play when regarding educational equality
in the country.
Conclusion
Education is imperative for ensuring a successful and fruitful society. The Bantu
Education Act did nothing more than institutionalized racism within South Africa and assure it’s
profligation throughout the generations. With the repeal of the act, not all is perfect. There are
still lack of supplies for many schools and locational segregation. The biggest victory is within
content. Schools are now not segregated within the content they teach their children. Black

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children are not taught to be apart of a lower sect of society, rather are afforded an equal
opportunity at the education once only afforded to whites. While the differences in economic
situations factor into the availability of education, the educational policy in South Africa is
drastically better than during the apartheid. Though there is evidence of improvement of the
education system of South Africa, there is still a need for the equalization in fiscal support to
allow for the disparities of the education between black and white South Africans to be removed.

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Appendix

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Works Cited
Aitchison, J. J. W. "A review of adult basic education and training in South Africa." Retrieved
May 10 (1997): 2005.
Byrnes, Rita M. “South Africa – Legislative Implementation of Apartheid.” South Africa –
Legislative Implementation of Apartheid. Government Publishing Office for the Library
of Congress, 1996. 17 Nov. 2015.
Christie, Pam, and Colin Collins. “Bantu Education: Apartheid Ideology or Labour
Reproduction?”. Comparative Education 18.1 (1982): 59–75.
Claassen, Chris. Rev. of Apartheid Education and Popular Struggles by Elaine Unterhalter, et al.
Comparative Education Review 39.4 (1995): 528–529. Web.
Cross, Michael, Ratshi Mungadi, and Sepi Rouhani. "From Policy to Practice: Curriculum
Reform in South African Education." Comparative Education 38.2 (n.d.): 171-82. Taylor
& Francis Group. Web. 15 Nov. 2015.
Fiske, Edward B., and Helen F. Ladd. Equity: Education Reform in Post-apartheid South
Africa. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2004. Print.
Jansen, Jonathan D. "Political Symbolism as Policy Craft: Explaining Non-reform in South
African Education after Apartheid." Journal of Education Policy 17.2 (2002): 199-215.
Taylor & Francis Online. Web. 15 Nov. 2015.
Johnson, Vernon D.. Rev. of Apartheid Education and Popular Struggles by Elaine Unterhalter,
et al. The International Journal of African Historical Studies 26.1 (1993): 202–204.
Web.

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Karlsson, Jenni. "The Role of Democratic Governing Bodies in South African Schools."
Comparative Education 38.3 (2002): 327-36. Taylor & Francis Group. Web. 15 Nov.
2015.
Lodge, Tom. “Political Corruption in South Africa: From Apartheid to Multiracial State.”
Political Corruption: Concepts and Context. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 2011.
403-424. Print.
Maile, S. "School Choice in South Africa." Education and Urban Society 37.1 (2004): 94-116.
Web. 15 Nov. 2015.
“National Party (NP) | Political Party, South Africa.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Ed.
Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 17 Nov. 2015.
Sayed, Yusuf. "Democratising Education in a Decentralised System: South African Policy and
Practice." Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education 32.1
(2002): 35-46. Taylor & Francis Group. Web. 15 Nov. 2015.
South African Schools Act (SASA) NO 84 of 1996:
http://www.education.gov.za/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=aIolZ6UsZ5U%3D&tabid=185
&mid=1828
Williams, J.P., ed. Comparative and International Education: A Diversity of Voices, Volume 2 :
Gendered Voices : Reflections on Gender and Education in South Africa and Sudan.
Rotterdam: Sense Publishers, 2012. ProQuest ebrary. Web. 8 October 2015.

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Notes from Dr. Layne’s talk
● don’t lose sight that whites are affected too: there are no black leaders that can aid the
growth of white South Africans
● after discussing the Bantu Act, what are the negative effects?
● what are the major educational reform policies
● maybe do the comparison of just blacks during and after, as we don’t truly talk about the
white education policies throughout this
● if we get rid of whites, we can even include the disparities between genders
● education affects: economics, global influence, find something that
● she liked our source of South African School Act of 1996, as it is the
● work on the evidence; clarify the language and terms (the reforms we are comparing, the
blacks and whites, or just looking at whites?
CONCLUSION

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● what are the disparities in regards to race
● has these disparities changed (increased or decreased) with new educational reforms ?
○ NEED to provide evidence
● What needs to happen in the future?
Use this instead of the class notes for the Bantu Education
http://www.sahistory.org.za/bantu-education-act-no-47-1953
The notes that she wrote out:
how do educational policies for black and white south africans students differ?
how have educational policies for black and white south african students changed since the end
of apartheid?
Bantu Education Act
it's ve effects during apartheid
its lingering effects since apartheid (post 1994)
For the Conclusion:
1.) what are the major educational reform policies? (primary and secondary (will we do
tertiary?)
2.) What is the evidence for the educational disparities with regards to race?

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3.) have these disparities increased/decreased with new educational reforms? provide
evidence
4.) what’s left to be done? what needs to happen?
Use Purdue OWL to figure out how to cite class notes