GARDEN ROUTE NEWS - The Department of Education district office in George has launched into 2022 with 10 new subject advisors who will be serving the Eden and Central Karoo area.
They have the daunting task of providing support to 50 high schools in the district.
"Subject advisors are specialist office-based educators (district or circuit office) whose function it is to facilitate curriculum implementation and improve the environment and process of learning and teaching by visiting schools, consulting with, and advising school principals and teachers on curriculum matters," says Tirzah Arendse, the school library service officer for curriculum support.
Almost all the subject advisors are based at the district office in George and they have to travel large distances.
"The district covers an area of about 61 500km². Murraysburg High School, for example, is about 400km from the district office in George, and Laingsburg High 300km. However, since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, they have adopted a blended approach in their support by visiting schools in person as well as having online/virtual meetings with teachers via MS Teams," says Arendse.
Helping teachers to become more comfortable with the use of technology in their teaching and assessment is also a challenging job.
"The advisors must furthermore deal with many different role players in education including principals, deputy principals, departmental heads, teachers, learners and parents."
Each school offers a selection of subjects which include a home language (Afrikaans, English or isiXhosa), a first additional language (Afrikaans or English), life orientation, mathematics and/or mathematical literacy and three other subjects.
Advisors support teachers in the Foundation Phase (Grades R to 3), Intermediate / Senior phase (Grades 4 to 7) and Sen/Fet (senior and further education and training phase - Grades 8 to 12).
The Eden and Central Karoo Education District comprises the municipalities of Beaufort West, Central Karoo, George, Kannaland, Knysna, Laingsburg, Langeberg, Mossel Bay, Oudtshoorn, Plettenberg Bay, Prince Albert and South Cape.
Meet the new advisors
• Adri Stoffels was recently appointed as life skills / life orientation advisor for Grades 4 to 7. She comes highly qualified with her experience ranging from teaching in Knysna to Kuwait and even Abu Dhabi. She is extremely skilled and passionate about the life skills field of studies and continually strives to not only excel in her own personal capacity, but also to further the standards of education in her field of expertise.
Adri Stoffels
• Suzette van Niekerk is the newly appointed Afrikaans subject advisor (Grades 8 to 12). She taught at Outeniqua High School in George for 13 years. Before that she was a head of department and subject head for Afrikaans at Wonderboom High and Akasia High in Pretoria. She has a daughter who completed Grade 12 last year and she is planning to study to become an intermediate phase educator.
Suzette van Niekerk
• Alma Snyman moved from Mpumalanga to take up her new position as geography subject advisor. She taught at Nelspruit High School where she managed geography. Snyman has 24 years' teaching experience and has been involved in the management of marking processes of Grade 12 geography. She has a 25-year-old son who is an electrical engineer in Somerset West. She is grateful and excited about serving the teachers and learners of the Eden and Central Karoo Education District.
Alma Snyman
• Mark Dokter was born and raised in Murraysburg in the Central Karoo. He graduated from the University of the Western Cape with a BSc (chemical science) and started his teaching career in 2011 at Zwartberg High School in Prince Albert where he taught for five years. He moved to Beaufort West Secondary School as the mathematics head of department in 2016 where he taught mathematics (Grades 8 to 12) until November 2021. Dokter is the Sen/Fet mathematics subject advisor.
Mark Dokter
• Pieter Kirsten, subject advisor for natural science and technology (NST), grew up in Bloemfontein where he started his education career. He has 24 years' teaching experience. His love for NST started in Bloemfontein where he was the subject head and the head of department of NST. He was also the director of the Bloemfontein Eskom Expo for Young Scientists. He is a highly motivated and positive person and is looking forward to this new venture and to add value to the subject of NST in the district. He is married and has a daughter.
Pieter Kirsten
• Keenan Rasmus is married and has three children. He is from Cape Town and started his teaching career in 2009 at Symphony High School in Belhar. Thereafter he taught at Tuscany Glen High School for 11 years. His last teaching post before moving to George to take up the Fet physical sciences subject advisor position was at Franschhoek High School.
Keenan Rasmus
• Keenan Moses grew up on a farm near Vleesbaai. He taught at George High School and is a husband and father. In 2020 he completed his master of education degree in educational psychology. His thesis concentrated on teachers' application of discipline in previously disadvantaged schools in the Western Cape. Moses takes up the role of Fet accounting subject advisor in the district.
Keenan Moses
• Nomava Mapisa is from Mossel Bay. She taught at Lehana Senior Secondary in the Eastern Cape for 11 years before transferring to Thembalethu High in George in 2011, where she served for three years. From 2014 to 2018 she was subject advisor for history in the Sen/Fet phase. She returned to this position on 1 December last year to serve in the Sen/Fet phase. She is a single parent of three children.
Nomava Mapisa
• Jul-Mir Geldenhuys is from Heidelberg. She taught at Kairos Secondary School in Heidelberg for 11 years before being appointed as the life orientation subject advisor in George.
Jul-Mir Geldenhuys
• Janette Jooste is the newly appointed subject advisor for the Foundation Phase in the Knysna Circuit. She is passionate about education and started teaching in KZN in 1993. For the past 15 years she has been teaching in the Eastern and Western Cape, where she loved working with the learners, but also ventured into facilitating many online and face-to-face training sessions with other educators.
Janette Jooste
With her husband of 28 years, mother, three children and two granddaughters as support and backup, she will remain a life-long learner, always striving to gain new skills and knowledge.
'We bring you the latest Garden Route, Hessequa, Karoo news'
