Spare a thought for many of the Class of 2015 as they fight back.

Grade 12's at Ocean View High School

Yesterday the Grade 12's started their NSC 2015 examination in full swing. I monitored the English examination at Ocean View High School where 140 students were ready to write their first paper of the Grade 12 final examination.  The untold stories of these resilient youth at Ocean View High school and all other schools across the country, can fill volumes.


Fourteen of these Grade 12's  at Ocean View High School were relocated to homes in Ocean View over the weekend. These learners live in Masiphumelele, an informal settlement that has been raging with unrests for the past few weeks. On Sunday, the principal and teachers of Ocean View High offered to accommodate their learners from Masi. These vulnerable learners need a place of safety and a space where they can study.

The school heads of Bridgetown High School and St. Andrews High School.

Masiphumelele High School is seriously under threat because of the violence and instability in the area. The Grade 12 learners too, had to be accommodated at another venue, far from their homes, to enable them to write the NSC examinations.


I spoke to the principals of Bridgetown High School and St. Andrews' High School at a dinner meeting hosted by the Confucious Institute at UCT.  These principals tell the same story. They have to find safe homes for a few of their learners who have no place to stay or  to study.  They too, tell me how they involve their own family members to assist with accommodation.

Last week a Lavender Hill High school Grade 12 student sat for her CAT examination even though she had just lost her father and brother. The father and brother were murdered in Capricorn, another informal settlement that also experienced a wave of killings, unrest and violence during the latest taxi wars.

This is the reality.