Parents must take back SA schools, says school choice proponent Marius Roodt

DUBLIN – There’s no doubt that South African schools face a lot of challenges. In a global benchmarking exercise, South Africa placed 75th out of 76 countries on the quality of its education system. Part of the problem is a persistent inequality in resources dating back to apartheid. The corrupt and abusive South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) must also shoulder part of the blame, as a high-level ministerial report outlined. The Institute of Race Relations, right-leaning local think tank, believes that desperate times call for desperate measures. They are proposing a school voucher programme to try to a force change in the troubled system. School vouchers are a controversial idea in many parts of the world. In this interview, Marius Roodt explains the IRR’s campaign and what it hopes to achieve. – Felicity Duncan