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Matric results announcement
The Department of Basic Education (DBE) has lauded the efforts of the Matric Class of 2025, saying the group has managed to manoeuvre and excel through some tough challenges such as inclement weather and teacher shortages.
Director-General Hubert Mweli highlighted some of these challenges during a Technical Media Briefing ahead of the official announcement of the 2025 matric pass rate.
Some schools, particularly across KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape, saw damages to critical infrastructure and the loss of learning time following severe flooding and hailstorms.
Mweli says the department held meetings on a daily to address inclement weather and to come up with interim relief measures.
“The DBE provided details on weather forecasts daily in advance to ensure provinces prepared adequately for any weather condition. In addition, candidates were allowed to write at examination centres that could be accessed during the inclement weather.”
Teacher shortages
Mweli says that while many new learners were absorbed into South Africa’s education system in 2025, not enough teacher posts were available to address the growing numbers.
He added that the building of new schools needs to be balanced with enough teaching posts to achieve a reasonable learner to teacher ratio.
Teenage pregnancies
Mweli praised what he termed as the the resilience of learners who were absorbed back into the schooling system after giving birth during their matric school year.
“Female learners are doing well – and are coming back to school even after they have conceived.”
COVID-19
Mweli says that the class of 2025 experienced a number of challenges because they started grade eight in 2021.
This was at the height of COVID-19 where the department had formulate a recovery plan such as rotational classes; and find a structured system to ensure that learners were able to catch up with interrupted schooling.
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