Decent and safe sanitation at school: In January 2014 the nation was horrified when the media reported on a little boy choking to death after falling into a school pit toilet. Six-year-old Michael Komape had just begun school that week at Mahlodumela Primary School in Chebeng village, Limpopo. The corroded toilet seat had collapsed.

The organisation Equal Education (see Resources) is campaigning for decent sanitation in all schools. Get your school involved by starting sanitation clubs or clean ups, as Yongama did in the story Do the right thing. Get inspired by reading here: www.equaleducation.org.za/campaigns/sanitation.

Learners demand better schooling: In 2012 learners from Moshesh Senior Secondary School in Matatiele in the Eastern Cape contacted the organisation Equal Education (EE) (see Resources) to ask for help. Their Principal had been away for nine months, they had too few teachers, teachers who often did not pitch up to teach, they lacked textbooks and conditions at the school hostel were poor. Via the courts EE helped them to force the Department to act. In 2013 a settlement was reached and the Department has planned a way forward. However, in April 2014, EE had to intervene once again as so little has been done so far in turning the school around.

Non-delivery of essential textbooks: In late 2011 the textbook Publishers Association of South Africa warned the Education Department that Limpopo had not yet ordered text books for 2012. The school year began and all the schools of the province were without textbooks. The case was taken on by the organisation Section 27 (see Resources), and ended up with a court order compelling the Department to take urgent action. Yet even as late as October that year, many books were still not delivered. Section 27 demanded that corruption be investigated – for example, entrepreneurs were paid to deliver books, but just dumped them. In 2014 Limpopo Department of Education is again in the news because it is still failing to complete one of its easiest tasks: ordering and delivering textbooks.

Getting rid of mud schools: The Department’s 400-500 rudimentary mud schools in the Eastern Cape are denying children their right to a quality modern education, and many are downright dangerous. In 2010, for example, 22 children were injured when four classrooms collapsed during bad weather at the Mrwabo Junior Secondary School. In 2007 the premier promised to replace all mud schools by the end of 2008. Nothing happened. In February 2011, the Legal Resources Centre (see Resources) took up a case on behalf of seven mud schools in the Libodes district of the Eastern Cape. The DBE promised to spend R8,2 billion to get rid of mud schools and improve all poor schools by March 2014. Yet officials have now admitted that only 150 of the 500 mud schools will be replaced by 2015.