Marude (Makhado)

Marude High School in Thohoyandou, where the government looked at the budget and said "you know what, fees are overrated, just show up." No fees sounds generous until you realise the school has 22 teachers trying to manage 566 learners, which means your educator is basically a traffic cop at a taxi rank, just waving people through and hoping for the best. Twenty-five kids per teacher, jy weet hoe is dit, by the time the teacher gets to you the period is over and you have learned absolutely nothing except patience. And then the matric pass rate, eish. Fifty-three percent. That means if you lined up the whole matric class, just over half of them walked out with something and the rest were standing there like they arrived at the wrong queue. Limpopo is beautiful, Thohoyandou has real energy, but a fifty-three percent pass rate means the school is basically a coin flip. Heads you pass, tails you repeat. The tuck shop probably has better odds. To be fair, no fees in a public school in Limpopo is actually doing something real for families who need it, and those 22 teachers showing up every day for nearly six hundred kids deserve a trophy and a long weekend. But the school itself needs to sit down and have a serious conversation with itself about that pass rate before it starts printing any motivational posters. **Overall verdict:** The heart is there, the money is not, and neither are about half the matric results, but at least it is free, which is more than most can say.