Voice of America’s appalling report on South African maths education

Voice of America’s appalling report on South African maths education

18-02-2015 | Johannesburg | MGLI

South African and international news agencies have always had a field day whenever maths and science rankings are published. Whether the rankings are objective or not, there is a dire need to address maths and science challenges in the country.  It is the opinion of many that the lack of accountability in maths education has immensely contributed to the dismal performance in maths and science. Some quarters of society have cited the teacher unions as being culprits through their over-protection of teachers thus buffering mediocre teachers from being flushed out of the system.

I will not get involved in the mudslinging but will express my disgust at the poor levels of journalism that are being shown whereby the “South African maths education crisis” is continually churned in publications without giving any tangible contribution to the solution. Journalists have surely found a story-filler such that when they do not have something interesting to write about they simply attack the government and the education system.

Anita Powell, a Southern African based reporter for The Voice of America News has written a poorly researched South African maths education article which tends towards attacking the person of Minister Angie Motshekga and President Jacob Zuma. In her article on the 17^th of February 2015 entitled “In South Africa, Math Skills Dangerously Lagging” http://www.voanews.com/content/south-africa-math-skills-lagging/2647263.html Powell shows that she is reporting on a subject she did not immerse herself in but merely repeated what she had heard through the grapevine.

Below are the fallacies and inconsistencies I have come up with:

1. The title “In South Africa, Math Skills Dangerously Lagging”, exhibits the alarmist and sensationalist tendencies bent on annihilating any positives in the South African maths education system.
2. Powell claims that she asked school kids the question “Does two plus two equal five?” and a staggering number of South African students couldn’t say for sure, because of poor standards for math education.

• What is a staggering number?
• What was the sample size?
• What was the age of these children?
• Where did this research take place?
• Under what conditions was this question asked?
• What is her interpretation of hesitation?
• Is speed a measure of maths proficiency?
• Has she performed speed tests elsewhere to conclude that South African students are slower?
• Can we attribute hesitation to respond to inability to calculate?

This part of Powell’s article shows that report is intended on sensationalism at the expense of the truth and the hard work associated with researching a good story. For Powell to conclude that poor standards of maths education are the cause is treasonous. How did she come to that conclusion? I challenge her to reveal her raw data and the research methodology.

3. Regarding her statement: “That became obvious earlier this year when the government released the nation’s dismal graduate exam rates.”

• Firstly, we in South Africa have always been aware of our issues and are doing our best to resolve the issue as opposed to non-value adding and under-mining reporting like Powell’s article. If one has a positive contribution then they are welcome.
• At least she could have said “matric results” or “NSC results” to show that she did some form of homework as opposed to calling our results “graduate exam rates”. This just shows she is one who is jumping on a popular bandwagon she doesn’t comprehend.

4. Concerning the WEF rankings she stated: “The World Economic Forum recently ranked the nation dead last in a global scorecard of math skills.”

• On the ground where we toil to improve the maths education in Africa, the WEF rankings are of no consequent as they are not based on empirical evidence but mere perception-based opinion polls among business executives who have no clue about the interventions programmes and initiatives on the maths education playing field. A lot is being done by government, corporates and NPOs to improve literacy and numeracy. Emphasis on the rankings, just like a myriad of journalists shows that she has no slight idea what she is talking about.
• What Powell should have criticised the government for is the fact that they refuted the WEF rankings but did go further and show comprehensive statistics of the positives gained. I believe the government should improve on celebrating its successes.

5. It necessary and sufficient that Powell provide the Department of Basic Education report that validates her statement, “The nation’s basic education department found that last year, just three out of a hundred students earned a score of higher than 50 percent in mathematics.” It should state which level this statistic represents.
6. Powell quotes Professor Elizabeth Henning as those she is an authority in the benchmarking of international maths education systems. It would be exciting to read any papers or articles she has published in this area of expertise.
7. Powell’s point on the problems faced by South Africa, like any other country, are attributed to lack of maths and science professionals. This is another case of hasty generalisations for emphasis which distorts facts. If Powell and/or Professor Henning have any tangible evidence on this it would be worthwhile to share it.
8. The statement “I can go on and on and on.… You name it.” Is poor writing for a professional journalist that I am not. This is fluff and insinuates that South Africa’s problems are greater than any other nation and the process of naming them is an exhausting exercise.
9. Powell’s cheap jab at Minister Angie Motshekga and President Jacob Zuma is uncalled for and just shows the weakness of her argument. She wrote “Math illiteracy sometimes seems pervasive in South Africa, with even the education minister publicly flubbing a particularly easy subtraction problem when announcing exam results earlier this year. And innumeracy goes up to the highest levels. President Jacob Zuma elicited laughter during a speech in 2014 when after attempting to read out the figure 939,360,000; he opted for the simpler “close to a billion.””

• Everyone makes mistakes; a seasoned mathematician like me can make mistakes. For her to take a pure mistake and try and extrapolate South Africa’s maths performance is the lowest form of journalism that one can get to.

It is sad that the world is full of journalists who report in a very irresponsible manner and get away with it. It is surprising how such a poorly researched article was passed by the editor of the publication. Journalists should stay true to their calling of truth seeking and informing the public without fear or favour.

Powell’s article is just but one article and is not the worst in the crop of badly written articles. The standards should be maintained to gain credibility of the public in this information age where access to information is easy and cheap. Journalists ought to give us the public a reason to come back to their publication. Everyone in society should be rolling their sleeves to contribute to the solution as opposed to being a churner of negative news without being part of the solution.

I challenge Powell to a Grade 6 maths test and we can ascertain her mathematical ability based on her speed of responses and lack of mistakes in the process.