The Basic Education Department has sent its condolences to the families of nine Mpumalanga pupils who were killed when the taxi they were travelling in overturned.
An employee from the Department of Basic Education had to be hospitalised after protesters stormed its offices in Tshwane.
With pupils officially back at school, full-time, the need to build more schools in Kraaifontein in the Western Cape has become more urgent.
The South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) said that rotational learning had been harmful to learners, affecting their cognitive abilities, disrupting the national school nutrition programme and taking a toll on their mental wellbeing.
For many children from poor households, it will be difficult to re-budget for the extra costs involved in full-time learning.
Grade 3 and 4 pupils were monitored and those learning in their home language are 18 months behind compared to children their age pre-pandemic.
The department said that around 46,000 pupils did not re-enroll in schools in 2021 but there is no data yet on how many have re-enrolled this year.
COVID-19 has not been kind to young South Africans as we see more of them dropping out of school. Eyewitness News spoke to some of them and spoke to experts to explain why this is happening. #SchoolDropout #Education
Young South Africans who dropped out of school during the pandemic have explained to Eyewitness News how they made the difficult trade-off between an education and survival.
During a panel discussion on measuring progress on the implementation of inclusive education, the Basic Education Department discussed how disabled students had faced unique challenges and how schools need to change.
Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said that they were lobbying for schools to return to full operation.
The High Court in Pretoria has granted AfriForum and two others' an urgent interdict against the Department of Basic Education.
The court application by AfriForum, Maroela Media and Anlé Spies – a 2021 matriculant – is asking the court to compel the department to continue with the release, arguing that the sudden change is both irrational and ill-informed.
The decades-long practice is now a thing of the past, with the Department of Basic Education citing the Protection of Personal Information Act.
Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said that over the next few days officials would be able to see where children without schools could be placed.
The Basic Education Department is hoping to clear the backlog in Gauteng by the end of this week when it will be able to see where there are openings.
Inland provinces are expected to return to school on Wednesday, while pupils in coastal areas will only resume a week later.
She was taken in November outside her school at gunpoint, while she was waiting in line to be sanitised and screened for COVID-19.
