Posts

Understanding school performance: High School selection

School selection can be a nightmare for even the most informed parents. In this post we try to help share some of the ways in which SAILI chooses scholarship high schools.

The driving force behind SAILI’s success is getting the best “bang for buck” we can from the schools on offer. To make sure we give our funders the best “return on their investment” we scout for strong candidates and place them in the strong schools.

How we scout for candidates is a topic for another day but, how we identify strong schools is the topic of this post. Read more

SAILI Target Programme

Attacking school data: Introducing a guide for ANA assessment data analysis

Annual National Assessments (ANAs) now take place all the way through primary school (Grades 1-6) and also at grade 9. In the Western Cape – students also write provincial tests at Grade 3, 6, and 9 (called systemics or LitNum tests). While there is debate about the about these assessments – it is clear that far too many students perform poorly for us to be comfortable with the results.

The Department of Basic Education Released the ANA Report 2013 in December and I am finally getting around to reading it. Predictably, the results make for pretty dismal reading.   Read more