The announcement of the 2021 matric results will be made on January 20, with provinces releasing results the next day, the Department of Basic Education (DBE) has confirmed.
On Friday, Minister of Basic Education Angie Motshekga held a media briefing where department heads detailed their 2021 matric readiness plans.
The Class of 2021 was the hardest hit by the Covid-19 pandemic, which struck while they were doing their Grade 11 year, and the same occurred this year.
With just 18 days to go, the DBE has highlighted its plans on how it will tackle the third round of National Senior Certificate (NSC) examinations during the pandemic, with the first being the 2020 group, then 2021 second-chance exams, and now the 2021 end-of-year NSC.
Motshekga said: “In our meeting yesterday I was informed that this cohort would be able to surprise us with better results than last year. They are a much resilient group and have a much better foundation based on their foundation of learning.”
DBE’s director for Examination and Assessment Priscilla Ogunbanjo said the 2021 cohort was a much larger group, with 735,676 full-time candidates, while the number of part-time candidates stands at 128,451.
She said of the 11,000 exam centres, 6,870 were for full-time writing and 4,130 for part-time. She stressed that there were designated centres for candidates who are infected with Covid-19 or show symptoms of the virus, and schools have isolation rooms as well.
There have been 41,596 exam markers across the country placed at 194 centres.
Important dates:
- October 22 – Signing of the pledge.
- October 27 – National Senior Certificate exams commence.
- December 7 – Last day of matric exams.
- January 6 – Umalusi evaluates results.
- January 20 – Minister announces results
- January 21 – Provinces release results.
According to the DBE, matric pupils have covered all angles of the curriculum and schools have put in extra support for Grade 12s. Most matric pupils had 1.5 hours to two hours of extra learning hours a day.
“They had no holidays, no Saturdays and no morning breaks. They were working and learning at all times,” said Ogunbanjo.