The many education systems that now constitute our Department of Education came with varying value systems that we are now trying to bring together to form a single value system for our schools. Education is very essential to addressing many of our social ills that extend from general society to our schoolrooms and there find nurturing and become firmly entrenched as part of our future. For this reason we cannot have an education system that is abstract from our reality. One of our greatest challenges during this period of transition is that of attempting to transform our country through an education that itself needs transformation. Educators thus have a challenge to understand this reality and position themselves appropriately for their task.
Educators are custodians of our value systems in the school environment.
We entrust our children, the future of our country to educators and therefore we have a responsibility to pay special attention to their working environment. I believe that teaching is more than just the mere imparting of textbook knowledge from a teacher to a pupil. It requires a special commitment that is lacking in some of our educators. Educators must be in the forefront in helping to shape the ideal of a common South African nation through the values that they emphasise in our children. To do this successfully they need support from the communities in which they work.