Education success does not come at the expense of children’s well-being

SA is celebrating a historic national matric pass rate of 88%. Headlines applaud progress, rankings are circulated, and provinces are pitted against one another. Beneath the numbers lies an uncomfortable truth we are reluctant to confront: many of these so-called “successes” come at the expense of children’s mental health, dignity, and overall well-being.

This reality becomes alarmingly evident when we look at provinces such as Mpumalanga and Limpopo. Once again ranked near the bottom of provincial performance tables, these provinces have increasingly adopted extreme schooling practices. Extended school hours, weekend classes, and relentless exam-driven schedules have become the norm.

Children are expected to attend school for the entire week, often from 6.30am until 4pm, with little regard for rest, family life, play, or the need for mental breaks. This approach raises a fundamental question: What kind of education system demands exhaustion from children and then measures success solely through pass rates? Children are not machines.

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They are not productivity units. And they are certainly not workers whose worth is measured by how many hours they can endure in a classroom. Research and lived experience consistently show that excessive academic pressure undermines learning rather than improving it.

Chronic fatigue, anxiety, burnout, and disengagement are not signs of discipline; they are warning signs. Expecting children under such conditions to perform at their best is not only unrealistic, but it is also deeply harmful. The reality is that this practice is widespread across township and rural public schools throughout the country.

Pupils in these schools are subjected to extended and rigid schedules, while children in former model C schools continue to learn during regular school hours, enjoying structured sports and extracurricular activities built into the school day. Many public schools no longer offer sport or play at all, a loss that not only deprives pupils of balance and joy but also deepens the inequality between schools that can nurture the whole child and those that cannot. The irony is striking; the provinces and systems imposing the most punishing schedules on children are not leading in performance outcomes.

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