Media

Newspaper articles I’ve written:

• 1.3million vaccinations behind – Financial Mail 8 July 2021 (W5)
• “Hunger in South Africa” – Daily Maverick 27 May 2021 (W4)
• “How 71% of SA wants the vaccine but 1% has it” – Financial Mail 12 May 2021 (W4)
• “Teacher pay freeze right move” – Financial Mail 25 Feb 2021 (Budget 2021)
• “Jobs bounce back but hunger persists” – Financial Mail 17 Feb 2021 (W3)
• “More than two million jobs returned when lockdown eased – but hunger persists” – Daily Maverick 17 Feb 2021 (W3)
• “The Lost Decade” – Financial Mail 30 Sept 2020 (W2)
• “Six reasons why schools must reopen if we are to fight COVID-19” – Daily Maverick 22 Jul 2020
• “Covid-19: Women are bearing more costs and receiving fewer benefits” – Daily Maverick 17 July 2020. Coauthored with Casale & Posel.
• “Representivity in NIDS-CRAM” – Financial Mail 15 July 2020. Co-authored with Kerr, Burger & Ardington.
• “A National Reckoning” – Financial Mail 15 July 2020. My essay summarising the NIDS-CRAM Wave 1 results. FM version here. (My slides from the launch, and Synthesis Report)
• “Maternal hunger and mental health” – Financial Mail 15 July 2020 (co-authored with Mark Tomlinson, appeared as “Feeding a family” in FM.
• “Government needs to come up with a plan to help poor families now that schools are shut“ – Business Day version 23 March 2020 (school feeding and coronavirus school closures)
• “Tito’s business unusual” – Financial Mail 27 Feb 2020 (on 2020 Budget)
• “Putting golf club needs before social housing is one way the rich fail the poor” – Business Day 22 Jan 2020
• “Not Making the Grade” – Financial Mail 24 Oct 2019 (blog version here)
• “Vast numbers of SA children can’t read but there is something we can do about it” Business Live 21 Aug 2019
• “Eastern Cape pioneers book printing and distribution scheme to pupils“ – Business Day 29 April 2019
• “Tablets won’t cure pupils’ problems” – Financial Mail 21 February 2019
• “The Emperor’s New Clothes: Reading and the 4th Industrial Revolution” – Daily Maverick 10th Sept 2018
• “Basic education thrown under the bus – and it shows in test results” – Business Day, 16 Apr 2018]
• “The real matric pass rate and the real site of failure” – Sunday Times article on Matric 2017; 14 Jan 2018
• “An open letter to the next president of South Africa: We need a Marshall Plan for Reading” – co-authored with David Carel [Daily Maverick, 6 Dec 2017]
• “Academically girls are streets ahead. So why do boys get paid more in their jobs?” [Sunday Times, 19 Nov 2017, on this paper, my blog version]
• “Matric really does start in Grade 1” [M&G, 27 Jan 2017]
• “Students contest the status quo” [M&G, 6 Jan 2017]
• “Higher education: Free for the poor not free for all” [Sunday Times, 16 Oct 2016]
• “Shaky data skews literacy results” (SACMEQ IV) [M&G 23rd September 2016]
• “Black graduate numbers are up” [M&G, 13 May 2016]
• “The biggest solvable problem in SA: reading” [The Star, 29 Mar 2016]
• “Afrikaans varsities perpetuate racial divisions” [The M&G, 4 Mar 2016]
• “Matric cracks starting to show” [Sunday Times, 10 Jan 2016]
• “While the rich get education, SA’s poor get just ‘schooling’” [Sunday Times, 8 Nov 2015]
• “Early action key to improving maths” [Business Day, 6 July 2015]
• “The ideal school system to get one’s head around” [Sunday Times, 25 Jan 2015, and online at Daily Maverick]
• “How to raise the ‘real’ matric pass rate” [Africa Check, 13 Jan 2015]
• “Education woes go far deeper than matric pass rate” [Sunday Times, 11 Jan 2015]]
• Assessment results don’t add up. [M&G, 12 Dec 2014]
• Every child must read [M&G, 21 Nov 2014]
• We need more than a stab in the dark. (co-authored with Hamsa Venkat) [M&G 8 Aug 2014]
• Education rankings: There’s madness in WEF methods [M&G, 13 June, 2014]
• Varsity buildings salute apartheid [M&G, 2 May, 2014]
• Education in SA: Still separate and unequal [Extended version of CityPress 12 Jan 2014 article]
• Matric is failing SA’s lost children [M&G, 10 Jan 2014]
• The economic value of matric and the importance of further education colleges [Africa Check, 10 Jan 2014]
• Assessment results don’t make sense [M&G, 13 Dec 2013]
• Matric assessment misses the mark [M&G, 22 Nov 2013]
• Teachers cannot teach what they do not know [Sunday Times, 18 Aug 2013]
• Making Wikipedia access free on mobile-phones – an idea whose time has come [Sowetan, 13 Jun 2013]
• School infrastructure: Motshekga, don’t shoot for the stars [M&G, 5 Jun 2013]
• Absentee teachers are a thorn in our side [M&G, 10 Mar 2013]
• Intervening after school is too late [M&G, 21 Sept 2012]
• A tale of two schools [Politicsweb, 31 Aug 2012]
• Back to the real basics [M&G, 11 May 2012]
• South African education: the poorest choice [M&G, 8 Apr 2011] (Co-authored with Prof Servaas van der Berg)

Television appearances [and other]

• HSRC Webinar: Safely Back to School (29 May 2020)
• Daily Maverick Webinar on COVID: School reopening, the great debate (28 May 2020)
• SAFM Jet Set Breakfast Interview (8 Dec 2019)
• Why can’t so many children read? [BBC World Service – 31 Jan 2019]
• Education Emergency (matric 2016) – [Carte Blanche – 15 Jan 2017]
• Western Cape had significant decline in maths and science scores – News24 interview [News24 – Nov 2016]
• SA scholars among worst in the world [News24 – Nov 2016]
• 56% of SA children cannot read [News24 – Nov 2016]
• 44% of Grade 5’s say they are bullied weekly [News24 – Nov 2016]
• 5% drop in matric pass rate no real shock – education expert
• ‘SA’s tragedy is an education system largely based on race’ (although the title is a little misleading, SES more than race.)
• SA education disparities are creating a poverty trap – expert
• Only 61% of pupils who enrolled in 2004 made it to matric – expert”
• We expected the pass rate to drop” – News24 interview #1 on Matric 2014 [Jan 2015]
• “SA has curriculum fatigue” – News24 interview #2 on Matric 2014 [Jan 2015]
• “Half a million dropout before matric” – News24 interview #3 on Matric 2014 [Jan 2015]
• “SA learners are acquiring learning deficits early” – News24 interview #4 on MAtric 2014 [Jan 2015]
• SA does not rank last for maths and science – News24 [June 2014]
• Don’t accept all facts about SA as truth – News24 [June 2014]
• School dropout in South Africa: 550,000 – eNCA [Jan 2014]
• Teacher content knowledge in South Africa – News24 [Jan 2014]
• The State of South Africa’s Education System – CNBC Africa [Jan 2014]
• Mathematics literacy in South Africa – News24 [Jan 2014]
• The Big Debate: Can Teachers Fix Education? -SABC 3 [Mar 2013]
• M&G 200 Young South African of 2013 [2013]

Interesting articles (education related):

• Neil Gaiman on “Why our future depends on libraries, reading and daydreaming“
• South Africa: Short-Changing the Youth – the Collapse of an Education System?
• Economist article from last year titled “Schooling the whole family: Teaching is improving but slowly. Getting parents involved could speed things up”. So many parallels between Mexico and SA. Many useful ideas in here for discussion and thought-experiments…
• Jonathan Jansen writes a short article on “Seven costly mistakes” [in SA education since the transition] – mostly just common sense, but people like to listen to him.
• Brilliant NYT article titled “Pass the books, Hold the oil” It’s basically just a new take on Dutch Disease using PISA scores and natural resource endowments.
• World Bank’s lead economist for South Africa writes an interesting article on low cost private schools in SA. Intelligent, informed and interesting article asking questions that need to be asked…(also see this FT article on private schools in SA)
• Economist article on class size in OECD countries – should we be putting the best teachers in front of bigger classes? Schleicher seems to think so.

• From Faust to Frankenstein – Markets alone should not determine our conception of what is desirable (must read!)
• Cool NYT article on the “Future of Economics isn’t so Dismal” where the author outlines young ‘Economists to watch” and though it was published in 2007 it is still interesting and has useful insight on making the discipline more practical and relevant.
• How did Rwanda cut poverty by so much? – Paul Collier responds to some questions
• Paul Graham’s take on the 5 regrets of the dying
• Interesting article on the politics of succession in the ANC, an excerpt:  ”ANC branch activists can make their way through this mishmash of the New Testament, Lenin, and Walt Disney without having to engage with uncomfortable realities of corruption, unethical campaigning and state incapacity.”
• Andreas Schleicher on Preparing teachers and school leaders for the 21st century
• An interview with Andreas Schleicher
• Interview with Esther Duflo: “Can better data end global poverty?”
• Wonderful and insightful article on “The Law’s Majestic Equality” which opens with a quote from Anatole France “The majestic equality of the law prohibits the rich and the poor alike from sleeping under bridges, begging in the streets and stealing bread”
• Great Article by Ferial Haffajee on the state of SA’s self-narrative. Attention ANC: We are a serious country with serious potential.
• Charming 2 minute video on organ donation – “Pass it on when you’re done with it” then register to become an organ donor here – it takes 3 minutes and you could drastically improve someone’s quality of life!
• Innovation in US higher education – the birth of a new Ivy League university “Minerva University” (Economist article) which has as its motto “Critical Wisdom”. We really do need (more ) innovation in higher education across the board.
• Top ten of urban businesses – sensible futuristic thinking like increasing data use in/by cities and the proliferation of ‘community nodes’ which act as “cafes, wireless work stations, libraries, book stores and micro farmers markets”
• Top 100 best NGO’s – in case you wanted to know…
• Wisdom from Calvin and Hobbes
• 50 most influential books of the last 50 years – useful link to have
• NYT article (22 March) on Cape Town’s racial divide
• M&G article (23 March) on Stellenbosch University and discrimination.
• Latest installment (Business Day 19 March) on the Adcorp vs UCT econometricians debate…as well as a detailed response by the UCT guys.
• “Creating a More Equal and Productive Britain” – A lecture by Professor James Heckman.
• Why is research higher status than teaching? An interesting article by a Canadian economist.