The teachers of Nigel High School are forced to live without basic facilities at a run-down boarding school, paying rent to the institution.
Half a dozen school students are living without electricity, water and sanitation at an abandoned boarding school facility at Nigel High School in Far East Rand.
They have been paying rent to the school for gold in the dilapidated building for years. The hostel was discontinued by the government post epidemic due to lack of funding.
A teacher, who lives in the abandoned building and did not want to take a name, said he and the school rely on neighbors to reach his associate services.
Teacher living in squall
The teacher said, “We survive on the kindness of close people.”
“We sometimes wire electricity from them and when the school is closed, the water bucket.”
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To ablute, teachers must walk in school, printed with some water instead of a shower, and use heat. But it only works during school hours, when the toilets are unlocked.
For this, they pay R3 000 to the school a month on rent. According to a source, in cash, in cash.
Inside, the Nigel High School Boarding House seems to have a good place to live years ago. Now, skeletons of old, dirty mattresses, linen and steel-frame beds are litter in many rooms. The roof pieces are missing, broken windows, bust concrete garden furniture and a collection of mourning on the outside.
Teachers pay R3K per month for rent
Line washing lines a passage. A part of the boarding house is closed with heavy security gates. On the other side, there used to be an industrial shape and a fully equipped kitchen.
“It is now empty, it is all stolen,” said the teacher.
DA spokesperson Mike Waters in Gauteng said he was surprised.
“Principal or Basic Education Department can justify paying rent to teachers to stay in such horrific circumstances? How can they teach children enough when they have to prepare a lesson in the dark and cannot be done properly?” He said.
The department did not respond to questions on the collection of R18 000 monthly fare from teachers in the hostels, but additional sources confirmed that monies were paid directly to school.
Sporting facilities run down and overgrade
The skeleton of the old boarding school is not just eye light. Sports features are run down and overgred.
According to a staff member, who spoke citizen In confidence, some time ago the maintenance equipment required by a financial institution was re -designed. This, while 1 000 students were made for about 300 students.
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Across the Sports Field forest, the pile of the old school desk has been closed. Apart from this, there was a place where students were able to make their teams happy. The old tennis court and a completely tennis practice court have been busted.
By this, the sports features of Nigel High School are limited to a single, some extent, to the football-cum–athletics field. There is a Netball Court that has been maintained to some extent but there is no fence. Paint paint from the walls and some broken windows line the corridors.
A senior school administrator said that the institution is in a decline due to the challenges of serious maintenance.
Decline
He said that a growing pupil population exceeds its original capacity. The administrator said, “Back in the day, we were created to accommodate 750 students.” “Now we are sitting with more than 1 000 students and the infrastructure cannot just face.”
Steve Mabona, spokesman of the Gauteng Education Department, said the number of pupils of Nigel High increases over time, which is due to the increasing population within Nigel and Heidelberg regions.
“The school has applied for three mobile classes, which will be distributed in the appointed time,” he said.
Nevertheless, the administrator said that the school is in financially strict straight.
The government said that the school should manage its own maintenance and operation by using the budget provided by the government, as well as the school fees.
The school should manage its maintenance and operation
However, what is necessary to run the school smoothly is much less than what.
He said, “We do not even have a toilet working in some areas.” “Football coach has been trying to get a lawn grass cutting machine for months. It is basic items, but just no money.”
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Allegedly, maintenance tools such as tractor-lawns were reproduced by financial institutions.
“Unless you can collect high school fees, which we cannot, you are on your own. And when the problems begin, they snow -and -the -door snowball snowball,” the administrator said.
Mabona said that it is the responsibility of the School Governing Board to maintain the facilities.
SGB responsibility to maintain school – GDE
He said, “However, due to tight economic pressure on businesses, school could not raise funds to maintain facilities. Accordingly, the collected school fees are sufficient to maintain school costs and pay salaries only,” he said.
Nigel High is a fee-paying school that charges around the R800 per disciple per year. On 1 000 students, it is around R800 000.
Waters said that the school is a museum for mismanagement.
“It’s absolutely shocking how the school could have been allowed to rot like this,” he said.
“On the one hand, the premiere Paniaza wants to build the lesufi classes where he can find a place so far, on the other hand, he has allowed to stabilize facilities like Nigel High School and regain a growing dirt.
‘Museum for Mudgery’
“Why the facilities present there cannot be made for decades, the mind cannot be maintained by bogles.”
According to Mabona, all maintenance challenges were given to the concerned authorities and said that the only real chronic aspect of the convenience is the old boarding school, which was closed.
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While Mabona did not answer direct questions about the teacher’s fare and did the department know about it; He said through WhatsApp message citizen It was challenging to answer this in the absence of information.
He committed to officially respond to the issue through e-mail, but it did not happen until the time of publication.
Without immediate intervention, the administrator warned, the risks of the school fall into a complete disorder.
School risk falls in disarray
“We need help from the municipality, from the government, anyone. If nothing changes, this place is the path of every other randandown public facility you seen. It has already started.”
Waters said that he would write to the chairman of the Gauteng Education Portfolio Committee, to request that the school inspection, “to reach the bottom of this unacceptable situation”.
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