1. Basic Education Laws Amendment Bill, 2009
SACE
15 February 2011

2. INTRODUCTION
SACE is a professional body that aims to enhance the status of the teaching profession through:
registration of professionally qualified and competent educators,
management and quality assurance of registered educators’ continuing professional development, and
safeguarding of standards of professional ethics.

3. Legislative and Policy Mandate
SACE is established in terms of the SACE Act no.31 of 2000
The SACE Act mandate Council to
Register educators;
Advise the Ministries of Education and the profession as a whole on professional matters;
Promote educators’ professional development, and
Ensure that they adhere to the Code of Professional Ethics

4. Legislative and Policy Mandate
SACE gets its other mandate from the National Policy Framework on Teacher Education and Development (NPFTED), April 2007
The Policy Framework mandate SACE to manage and implement the Continuing Professional Teacher Development (CPTD) System
The Policy Framework stipulates that the Department of Education (now Basic Education) will resource the management and implementation of the CPTD system by SACE

5. Basic Education Laws Amendment Bill
Focus Areas
Professional Development
CPTD System and its Resourcing

6. Professional Development
We need to start by clarifying the professional development roles of SACE because it plays a different professional development role from the Department of Basic Education
SACE is not a provider of professional development and therefore the provisioning of professional development for teachers is NOT one of its functions

7. Professional Development
The Department of Basic Education, at national and provincial levels, has the responsibility of ensuring that teachers are offered various professional development programmes and activities
SACE, on the other hand plays a role of developing the profession as a whole.
Part of this role involves, amongst other things, promoting and facilitating professional development, managing and implementing the CPTD system, monitoring the uptake of professional development by teachers, and identifying the needs of the profession

8. Professional Development
In the light of the SACE professional development background provided, section 17(iv) of the Bill needs to be amended to read as follows:
“must promote the in-service training of educators”
We are also making a submission to add a new sub-section (17(v) that reads as follows:
Must manage and implement a Continuing Professional Teacher Development (CPTD) system which will be resourced and supported by the Department of Education, as contemplated in the National Policy Framework on Teacher Education and Development, April, 2007

9. Funding Of CPTD System
Section 25A of the Bill should be amended and read as follows:
“the specific employer of educators as contemplated in section 3 of the Employment of Educators Act 76 of 1998 will be responsible for supporting and funding the management and implementation of the CPTD System”.