The country’s top matric student says she never expected to scoop the top honour.
Madelein Dippenaar was received with fanfare at Paarl Gimnasium Hoërskool on Wednesday as Western Cape Education MEC Debbie Schäfer, fellow matriculants and teaching staff honoured the blushing teen.
The 18-year-old achieved an astonishing 96.9% aggregate while her school achieved a 98.7% pass rate.
Schäfer said: “I chose this school last year already, as it is the school of the son of one of my SAPS protectors, who collected his results today.
“My protector joined me at the release of my twin daughters’ results in 2017, so I wanted to do the same for him today!
“Coincidentally, I found out only recently that it is also the school of the top candidate in the country, Madelein Dippenaar. So it was a double celebration.”
In another huge honour, the second and third top performers are also from the Western Cape.
Madelein, together with Gary Allen from Rondebosch Boys High School and Anuoluwa Makinde from Milnerton High School claimed the top three positions in the country.
Schäfer said she was proud of the province’s performance after they attained an 82.3% pass rate, an improvement from 2018’s 81.5% provincial pass rate.
“I am also delighted that the Western Cape achieved a trifecta in terms of the top three candidates in the country overall, and the top two in Mathematics,” said Schäfer.
Timothy Murphy from Rondebosch Boys High School took top honours for Mathematics in the country followed by Ivan Badenhorst from Outeniqua High School.
Schäfer added that the number and percentage of Bachelor passes has increased – to 21 981 - while the province also achieved the highest percentage of distinctions in the country.
Madelein, originally from the Northern Cape, said she was delighted with her achievements.
“I expected to do well, but this is just so overwhelming,” she said.
She praised her parents and teachers for her achievements and plans to study towards a BSc Degree in Molecular Biology at the University of Stellenbosch.
The slimkop was one of two students from South Africa who visited US space agency Nasa in 2018 to study a project about human travel to Mars.
Schäfer said that while further interventions and improvements are needed, there is no argument that the inequality gap in education is closing.
“Over the past 10 years, schools in Quintiles 1-3 (no-fee schools) have improved their pass rate by 16.7 percentage points from 56.7% in 2009 to 73.6% in 2019.
“Quintile 4 and 5 schools (fee-paying schools) have increased only slightly during this same period with 2.4 percentage points from 83.3% to 85.7%.”
Meanwhile, nationally, there are more public schools with no matric passes.
Mathanzima Mweli, the director-general of the Department of Basic Education, announced that schools with 0% passes increased from 12 in 2018 to 16 in 2019.
HONOURED: Brian Shreuder (head of WCED) and top 4 students in province
Mweli described the increase as a “sad story” while scores of schools have as few as 20% of their matric learners passing.
Publicly available evidence showed that all poorly performing schools were badly resourced.
“Some of us are going to live in those schools that are not performing to make sure that they are performing,” said Mweli.
In the latest results, Free State claimed top honours with an 88.4 percent pass rate, while Gauteng came second with 87.2 percent.
CELEBRATION: Settlers High School in Bellville. Picture: COURTNEY AFRICA/AFRICAN NEWS AGENCY
If you did not achieve your desired results, and would like to receive counselling, you can approach your school, or phone the Safe Schools Hotline - 0800 45 46 47
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If you want to do supplementary exams, have remarks or rechecks, check out wcedonline.westerncape.gov.za/nsc-exams
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