The Western Cape Education Department says they experienced problems with their online system since the beginning of registration on Monday, however the system is fixed now.
Registrations to enrol children for the 2021 school year opened on Monday and closes on March 17. More than 43 000 people have already registered on the online application site.
The Department‘s spokesperson, Bronagh Hammond, says they had problems with their system where it was slow at the beginning,
“We rely on SETA service to get up and running, many of the problems were beyond our control. However, we have we have been working with the SETA team and they have been trying to assist us. Once it was back up we saw an influx of parents wanting to go onto the system because of problems experienced before, it was fixed and the put overload on the system. We do apologise to the parents that were on it and failed, to continue with their process. Now I feel that the system is working well.”
Hammond says the purpose of the online system is to streamline their systems to reduce the admin of the schools in terms of putting the applications on the system.
“The online system also allows us to monitor how many applications we have received, where we have received the applications, where there will be demands so that we can plan appropriately and to also to try to get our learners in our schools, applied, ready for the next school year as soon as possible so that we can concentrate on those that do not have place.”
She says, “The site asks for child’s interest, are they good at sports? Are they good at cultural activities? Where they previously a prefect? What kind of leadership positions have they had?”
Hammond says, “We’ve had 43 000 parents that have made unique registrations on that site with over 100 to 400 itself to different school across the province. This is quite a high numbers than what we saw last year at the same time.”
She says parents who cannot do online application can do paper based application.
“The paper based application is still there but if you do have the opportunity to go online then we ask that you do so. Many questions are actually assisting parents with online applications at their schools using their computer laboratories.”
In audio below Bronagh Hammond explains how the system works:
Meanwhile, Gauteng Education Spokesperson, Steve Mabona says they do not have a date as to when their online registration system will go up.
