Educational policy and practice has resided and continues to reside at the vortex of social and political strife in South Africa, as in the United States. The political foundations of education in South Africa were perhaps never more evident than in 1976 when students in Soweto rebelled against the National Party's declaration that Afrikaans would become the language of instruction for mathematics and social studies in Black high schools. That rebellion helped to undermine the apartheid regime, which finally lost power to the African National Congress (ANC) 18 years later. One of the Nationalist government's greatest failures, education, arguably is now one of the ANC's greatest challenges (van Schalkwyk, 1998).

During Sue's six-month stay in Pretoria in the summer and fall of 2007, she and Thembi talked with 29 teachers working in a range of demographically and economically diverse schools across South Africa. (1) Asked about their aims and objectives as educators, the teachers overall expressed support for the momentous transformation in which South Africa is engaged. Yet this desire was tempered by anxieties among many of the White teachers about the implementation of a national curriculum and teaching philosophy that many seemingly do not fully understand or like, and by frustrations among many of the Black teachers with the slow pace of redress and broader social change. Almost all of the Black teachers shared cries for concrete help: Schools need more resources, classes are overcrowded, basic school infrastructure is missing, startling numbers of children have lost their parents to HIV and AIDS and are now caring for themselves and their siblings, primary school students are targeted by drug dealers, and so on. As a teacher in a rural school in the province of Mpumalanga put it, "We don't feel the change. We now have democracy, but we're still in the same schools. We still have the same families, the same parents who are still poor."

Although the sample of teachers is clearly too small to reach definitive conclusions, the teachers' comments suggest a philosophical divide within the education profession that has important implications--both as a "report card" on the educational reforms that have been made in South Africa, especially with respect to funding, and with respect to educational reform in other countries, including the U.S. Holding up South Africa as a mirror, we see more clearly a schism within the profession of education in the U.S.--a schism born of differential access to the "culture of power" and a "silenced dialog" about its educational significance (Delpit, 1988). Although school poverty and inequities among schools in the U.S. pale in comparison to conditions in South Africa, the two nations have much in common, including histories of state-sanctioned segregation in schooling as well as halting efforts to refashion those systems without undermining structures of advantage (Ball, 2006; Russo, Beckmann, & Jansen, 2005). Our purpose in this article, however, is not to compare U.S. and South African teachers' views of educational reform, but rather to consider the broader significance of the South African teachers' experience of educational reform--specifically, lessons U.S. policymakers might learn from these teachers about education and social justice.

As a context for exploration of the teachers' comments about their aims as educators, the sections that follow offer a brief overview of the political and historical circumstances of schooling in South Africa and a short discussion of the theoretical foundations and methodology of the study. The article concludes with discussion of the significance of the teachers' comments for those seeking educational reform that leans towards social justice.

Schooling in South Africa

The Bill of Rights in the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa (1996) affirms the right "to a basic education, including adult basic education, and to further education, which the state, through reasonable measures, must make progressively available and accessible" [Section 29(1)(a)]. In response to this constitutional promise, the new government introduced a range of reforms intended to rectify the gross inequities of apartheid education. These inequities included per-pupil spending ten times greater for White students than for Blacks, stark differences in teacher qualifications in the Black and White schools, marked differences in teacher pay even when there were no differences in qualifications (Black teachers still were paid less), and a curriculum designed to inculcate the government's racist views (Thompson, 2000). The so-called Bantu Education system under which Blacks were educated "deliberately neglected education in science and mathematics and rested on a racist anthropology designed to generate cheap labor for what remained a colonially organized economy" (Asmal & James, 2001, p. 186). In 1995, 19% of the population had no formal education, and 92% of this 19% were Black Africans (Asmal & James, 2001). The new education system brought an amalgam of 17 separate and highly unequal race-based school systems under a national umbrella, with one national and nine provincial departments of education. Nine years of schooling were made compulsory, a national curriculum was adopted, and a new scheme for school funding was established.

In the early 1990s, when the apartheid state was crumbling, the government allowed parent bodies to change their school's legal status and thereby permit any student to enroll. Four options were provided, including becoming an independent (private) school. When restructuring was complete, 96% of the White schools had opted to become "state-aided." This was the Model C option, which permitted schools to admit Black students up to 50% of their maximum enrollment and to charge fees. With this structure already in place, the new government commissioned a panel of experts to make recommendations about school funding. The panel (known as the Hunter Committee) endorsed a "partnership funding" approach, including user fees and private contributions, with the caveat that children whose families could not or did not pay the fees should not be expelled (Roithmayr, 2003). The Department of Education also sought advice from two international consultants, who recommended that schools be allowed to charge fees of families who could afford to pay, in part as a way to keep "important stakeholders"--i.e., the White middle and upper classes--"fully engaged with public education, leading to better budgets and accountability" (Roithmayr, 2003, pp. 51-52).

The resulting legislation, the South African Schools Act of 1996 (known as the Schools Act), extended the option of charging fees to all public schools and made it illegal for schools to turn away learners whose parents or caretakers could not or did not pay the fees. (2) A provision added in 1998 requires School Governing Bodies (SGBs) to grant full or partial exemptions to families whose incomes fall below thresholds linked to the size of the fees. The National Norms and Standards for School Funding accompanying the Schools Act require the progressive redistribution of funding for books and other school supplies to favor the neediest learners. However, these supplies constitute only about 10% of school budgets; most of the remainder goes to educator salaries (Veriava, 2007).

Amendments to the Schools Act, implemented in 2006, strengthened regulations around fee exemptions and allowed the minister of education to declare some schools "no fee," provided these schools receive "adequate" state subsidies. Although national funding norms have been established as adequacy benchmarks, provincial departments of education are not required to adopt them--hence the possibility of "inadequate" subsidies (Veriava, 2007). For 2009, schools serving 40% of all learners were forbidden to charge fees, and schools serving another 20% of learners chose not to charge fees. "No fee" schools receive significantly higher state subsidies than other schools, but these subsidies do not match the revenue generated by user fees.

How is the South African education system faring today? The increasing number of "well-heeled foreigners" enrolling their children in South Africa's elite independent schools suggests that the top schools in the nation rival the best in the world (Blaine, 2007b). However, these schools educate very few South Africans. Although more children and youth in South Africa are attending primary, secondary, and tertiary institutions than ever before, many learners are dropping out of school after grade 10. In 2007, 31.5% of all 18-year-olds were out of school--a percentage that has increased since 1996 when 24.3% of all 18-year-olds were not attending school (Statistics South Africa, 2007). An international comparison of children's reading skills (Mullis, Martin, Kennedy, & Foy, 2007) found that South African students scored lowest among 40 participating countries. According to this study, almost 80% of primary school pupils in South Africa are below the lowest benchmark.

Pro-poor funding policies are slowly making school resourcing more equitable (Gustafsson & Patel, 2006). Nevertheless, stark disparities in funding and school conditions persist (Fiske & Ladd 2004), and arguably have now been "locked in" through the fee-based structure of funding (Roithmayr, 2003). Although state subsidies favor the poorest schools, the ability to levy fees gives schools in middleclass and wealthy communities an enormous advantage. Many SGBs use their fee revenue to hire additional teachers (Fiske & Ladd, 2004). At some of the wealthier schools, "SGB teachers" comprise more than halfthe staff. Consequently, principals in the higher quintile schools act as full-time administrators whereas principals of schools in rural areas routinely teach, some for most of the day.

School infrastructure improved markedly between 1999 and 2006 (Department of Education, 2007). Among other measures of progress, the percentage of overcrowded schools fell from 51% to 24% of all schools. Still, as of 2006, almost 12% of South Africa's 25,145 schools had no water, almost 17% had no electricity, and just over 5% had no toilets. Of the schools with toilets, 60 were using the "bucket system" and 8,509 had only pit latrines. In the Eastern Cape, one of the poorest provinces, 40% of the schools were judged to be in poor condition. In the nation overall, only 7% of the schools had adequate libraries, and only 10% of all secondary schools had functioning labs. Almost 70% of the schools had no computers, and only 2% were equipped for disabled learners.

By law, all public schools in South Africa are now open to all students. However, this national "choice" system does not provide meaningful access for multiple reasons (Ndimande, 2006; Woolman & Fleisch, 2006). For one, provincial heads of departments can determine school feeder zones. Where these exist, learners who live within a zone are first in line for admission, and those whose parents work in the area are second in line (Department of Education, 1998). The best schools--which, in terms of resources and achievement, are still the former Model C (White) schools in cities--rarely have additional openings. Secondly, the cost of transport to a chosen school is often prohibitive for learners in townships. From rural areas, the sheer distances make these schools inaccessible. Consequently, Black learners have started to integrate some of the former White, colored, and Indian schools, but this has been a one-way street, with virtually no movement in the other direction--i.e., White students enrolling in Black schools (Soudien, 2004.)

The school funding scheme also remains problematic (Veriava, 2007). Provincial subsidies often come late in the school year, so some "no-fee" schools still charge fees. Several teachers at "no-fee" schools said their SGBs charge fees, then offer to reimburse parents when the government funds arrive, but hope the parents decline the offer. The state subsidies often are inadequate in any case, so principals and SGBs must undertake a host of donation-solicitation and fund-raising activities, including sending learners out to collect discarded cans. At many of the poorer fee-charging schools, a large number of parents do not pay the fees. Although schools legally must provide exemptions for eligible families, many SGBs and principals feel their schools cannot afford to enroll learners whose families cannot pay.

On June 1, 2007, about a million South African educators joined a month-long public service strike. This was the largest and longest teachers' strike in the nation's history since democracy. Although many of the White educators struck for only a day or not at all, all five of the teachers unions joined the strike to protest teachers' pay. Bloch (2008) offered this perspective:

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