A R631 000 donation from GrandWest is assisting a Belhar and a Mitchell’s Plain school to offer a maths intervention programme to prepare pupils to face their upcoming maths exams with confidence.
Grade 8, 10 and 11 learners at AZ Berman High School and Grade 9 learners at Excelsior Secondary School will complete the 20-week programme in time for the end-of-year exams. The training runs every Saturday until November, with breaks that coincide with school holidays.
“The complexities of maths can be incomprehensible to pupils who lack a good understanding of the core principles of the subject. The Maths Intervention Programme takes them back to basics to bed down their knowledge of key maths concepts and shows them how to apply them. They won’t just ace their exams though. This maths grounding will equip these youngsters with a ‘problem solving’ mindset that will guide their thinking in every aspect of their lives in the future too,” said Mervyn Naidoo, General Manager at GrandWest.
According to Naidoo, GrandWest is committed to the upliftment of our under-resourced schools, and one way of doing this is through supporting initiatives that will provide learners with access to quality education. The maths enrichment programme is such an example.
Both schools are part of the GrandWest adopted school programme for 2022. AZ Berman High School is a previous recipient of the programme and so it made sense to continue our support for a bigger impact, and they added Excelsior Secondary School as well.
The programme is facilitated by Math and Me, a company founded upon passion for youth development, and focused on providing additional maths teaching.
In addition to the Maths Intervention Programmes, earlier this year GrandWest also sponsored a Leadership Workshop for AZ Berman’s Representative Council of Learners (RCL) and prefects at a cost of just under R43 000.
Management at the school noticed a lack of leadership qualities within their two biggest and most influential leadership components, namely the RCL and the prefects. Many learners experience anxiety attacks so these two parties must work cohesively together. The workshop took the form of a self-actualisation programme for the learner governing body.
According to Tamsyn Baynes, educator at AZ Berman Highschool, after analysing their term performance for the Grade 8s, only four learners out of the 234 passed overall. “We needed help for our learners and we chose to focus on mathematics. Our mathematics results, have always been a concern, but particularly bad this year”.
Baynes then asked the principal for permission to get outside help for their learners.
Since then, the school has been involved in multiple events, programmes and projects with Grandwest. “Our learners have been so lucky to be part of such an amazing organisation, which grounds itself by giving back to the communities.”
The school reviewed their term performance at the end of the second term and was shocked at how tremendously the results improved not only in Mathematics but overall.
From a 4% pass in Term 1 to a 65% pass in Term 2, overall.
“The learners started believing in themselves, they became more confident in mathematics, as a result, they started improving in other subjects as well,” said Baynes.
Management then considered the possibility of reintroducing mathematics in Grade 10.
According to the educators from these two schools, the schools would benefit from this as mathematical skills play an important role in other subjects.
“We are hoping that our learners lose the negativity towards mathematics and do their best in the subject,” Baynes concluded.
