Education minister Naledi Pandor has acknowledged there are problems with the way maths, science and technology are taught in South African schools, and says more money will be spent on training teachers of these subjects this year.
The minister was speaking in Midrand last week at the Aggrey Klaaste Maths, Science and Technology Educator of the Year Award. The awards, organised by the Telkom Foundation, aim to improve the quality of technology teaching.
There is no more pressing aim in education today than to improve the quality of maths, science and technology teaching, since maths "plays the role of a gatekeeper in the modern scientific world", said Pandor.
"Pupils will only be allowed to pass through this gate if their passport is endorsed with a higher grade maths pass."
Pandor said despite attempts to upgrade the qualifications of teachers, only half of the maths and science teachers had studied these subjects beyond secondary school level.
She noted that traditional mathematics teaching also had to evolve to cover "mathematical literacy".
"The power of computers and the pervasiveness of the media ensure no individual`s life is unaffected by numbers, numerically-based arguments and the need to make decisions based on such information that is represented in words, graphs, tables, formulae and equations," she added.
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