Esethu Primary School (Mthatha)

Esethu Primary School in Mthatha, Eastern Cape. 443 kids. 12 teachers. A ratio of 36.9 to 1. Bra, that is not a classroom, that is a taxi. A full, overloaded, no-more-space-but-we-making-space taxi, and the teacher is the driver screaming "skuif op" while trying to explain fractions to 37 children who are basically sitting on each other's laps. Twelve educators for 443 learners. Twelve. You know what else comes in twelves? Eggs. And right now this school is running on scrambled. One teacher is probably doing Grade 4 Maths in the morning, Grade 6 English after break, and supervising the soccer field at lunch because there is nobody else. The poor person is not a teacher, they are a one-man WCED rescue operation. Jy weet hoe is dit. And Mthatha, eish, the Eastern Cape, where the government promises are as reliable as load shedding schedules and the school infrastructure has been "under review" since approximately 1994. You have to respect the kids and the teachers here though, because they are showing up and making it work with basically nothing, which honestly takes more guts than any school in a leafy suburb with a heated pool and a part-time counsellor named Brendan. Overall verdict: Esethu is basically running a miracle on a shoestring budget with the staffing of a tuck shop, but those 12 teachers deserve a Springbok jersey and a long weekend.