An anxious few hours as matrics prepare to receive their results

Today is the day that last year’s matrics have been waiting for – Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga is expected to announce the 2017 National Senior Certificate matric results.

The announcement will be made at the SABC’s Auckland Park offices this evening.

A “technical briefing” is scheduled to start at 4pm, when the processes surrounding the examinations are expected to be discussed. The official release of the matric results is scheduled to start at 6pm.

Get your matric results here.

A reported 789 289 pupils wrote the examinations – 37 828 fewer than the number who wrote in 2016.

In 2016, 72.5% passed the NSC examination – a 1.8 percentage point increase from 2015’s 70.7% pass rate.

The number of progressed pupils – pupils who advanced to matric after failing Grade 11 twice – is expected to once again have a dramatic effect on the pass rate.

In 2016, more than 100 000 of the roughly 800 000 matriculants were progressed pupils.

Without the progressed pupils, the 2016 pass rate was 76.2% compared 74% in 2015.

Pupils are “progressed” to “ensure learners don’t get frustrated and drop out,” the education department’s Dr Rufus Poliah previously told News24.

However, pupils are still required to pass the matric examinations to pass.

Those who didn’t get the results they were hoping for needn’t have sleepless nights, advises an education expert. While lower-than-expected results might feel like the end of the world in the moment, there are options.

Read: Disappointed with your matric results? Here’s how to move forward

Meanwhile, the Democratic Alliance has wished last year’s matriculants “all the best as they embark on tertiary education and other post-school ventures”.

“It is imperative to know whether there has been any progress made in the performance of our schooling system at the senior level, especially given that 41% of the learners enrolled in Grade 10 in 2015 did not enrol for matric in 2017,” the party’s education spokesperson Nomsa Marchesi said this morning.

“The DA is committed to the provision of quality basic education and will continue the fight to ensure that all our children have access to it.” – Additional reporting by James de Villiers, News24