If there was one picture that drove Black Twitter nuts last week it was a photo showing seven high schoolers holding up the South African flag after a “record-breaking performance” at the International Mathematics Olympiad in Australia (10-20 July). One silver medal, four bronze medals and an impressive 38th position out of 110 participating countries.
Why the furore? Not one of the seven looked phenotypically Black African. Three Asian-looking students. Three probably white. And one undecided but certainly not dark-skinned African.
“You can see it was not a dancing competition,” sniped a commentator on X. “There’s a big elephant in the room,” sighed another. “Colonisation did a serious number in Africa,” unleashed a popular posting, taking us way back. “I didn’t sight a single native South African in the image,” observed one with jaundiced eyesight.
So let’s first get the racists out of the debate. If based on a sample of seven you believe that white or Chinese South Africans, for example, are more intelligent in mathematics (or any other field of human achievement) than black citizens then stop reading this column, for I have nothing to say to you. If, on the other hand, you believe that these young achievers are less African/South African than dark-skinned people, then please find another place to ply your narrow-mindedness.
Now for the facts. Yes, the history of colonialism and apartheid explain the gross inequalities that still bedevil education, but it has been 30 years and that cannot be the whole explanation. Blacks are high achievers in virtually every field of human endeavour from athletics (we now dominate sprints in junior and senior track), we have produced world-class opera singers of which the unbelievable Pretty Yende is only one example, and we led from the global South in fields like infectious diseases and vaccine science, having discovered among other breakthroughs, the omicron variant.
Nor does the snapshot of one year’s top performers represent the whole picture when it comes to race and mathematics. There was a Nkonyane in 2023, a Kasi in 2021, a Bopape in 2019 and so on. Girls, boys, black, white, English, Indian, Afrikaans in recent years. Still, in a country that is more than 90% black, why so few from among the majority?
We have the only rugby team on the planet that won three world championships with our most diverse sporting team with black stars in every position. Why? Because there are multiple, reinforcing structures from pre-school through schools and clubs that from a broad base of participation choose the best among them to represent South Africa.
Pure and simple. It is the choices we make. The more I studied the performance of this select group of young people, the more I realised what incredible hard work lay behind their performance. They spent many months in training preparation. There were camps spanning a year. They started way back with a commitment to mathematics that involved parents, teachers and professionals travelling around to other countries including Botswana, where the Pan-African Mathematics Olympiad was held in June this year. The head of the South African mathematics foundation, Prof Seithuthi Moshokoa, makes the salient point: “Mathematical excellence is built over years of dedication, curiosity and rigorous training.”
We have the only rugby team on the planet that won three world championships with our most diverse sporting team with black stars in every position. Why? Because there are multiple, reinforcing structures from pre-school through schools and clubs that from a broad base of participation choose the best among them to represent South Africa. Let me be clear, until there is a Craven Week for mathematics, don’t expect the representation of Olympiad teams to change any time soon.
Forget Verwoerd for a moment: what choices have post-apartheid education policymakers made to undermine black achievement in mathematics? We brought in a subject called mathematical literacy to boost achievement with an increasingly small pool of pure maths learners. We use the lowest of pass rates (30%) and proudly declare with great festivity that are children are doing well in mathematics and other subjects. Teachers even tell children in grade 12 to choose “the low hanging fruits”, the simplest questions, just to get them over the pass line.
In Singapore, China, Japan, Norway, Finland and Korea they would find such behaviour in policy and practice to be extreme, if not weird. While those countries bring in AI tools to boost elementary school mathematics in the 21st century, our teachers struggle to find competent maths teachers for work in overcrowded classrooms.
Where other countries invest in the potential of all their children to do mathematics, our policymakers, planners and practitioners seem to collude in sending messages that pure maths is for the smart kids and the rest do its “literacy” equivalent.
We made those choices. Accept responsibility. Stop blaming the past alone.
To the seven children in those math Olympiad photos, I have a message for you. Well done. South Africa is proud of you.
For opinion and analysis consideration, email opinions@timeslive.co.za
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.