Local science teacher wins award
2007-03-08
A FORMER maths and science teacher at William Lloyd Primary, Denise Ontong, has won a provincial Aggrey Klaaste Award for Maths, Science and Technology Teacher of the Year in the category for retired teachers.
The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) presented the awards of R5000 in association with The Telkom Foundation, the Aggrey Klaaste Nation Building Foundation and the Sowetan newspaper.
The winners are now in the running for the national awards, to be presented on 22 March.
Ontong is project co-ordinator for the Paarl Association of School Governing Bodies.
“I have committed myself to supporting maths, science and technology education since I retired five years ago.
I now work with 42 schools in the Paarl, Wellington, Simondium, Mbekweni and Franschhoek areas,” says Ontong.
“It feels good and I’m proud that I could achieve this even though I’ve left mainstream education. There’s still such a lot to be done out there!”
She has established four maths and science community centres where she draws learners from various schools together to learn more about maths and science after school and during school holidays.
This prepares learners for local and provincial Maths Olympiads and Science Expos.
She and a group of teachers have facilitated the Maths Olympiad process in Paarl, to prepare learners for the provincial Olympiad held annually at the University of Cape Town.
With her team, she has also encouraged schools to participate in Science Expos and as a result, 28 schools participated in the local Expo last year, where 128 learners presented 64 projects.
Twenty-five of these projects appeared at the provincial Expo in Stellenbosch. Three learners presented their projects on a national level in Pretoria in September, accompanied by her.
Criteria for the awards include a track record in producing good results, a passion for the subject and promoting a love of the subject among learners, leading by example, and involvement in professional associations and the community.
The other two award winners are teachers Joey Griessel from Worcester East Primary School and Zeid Baker from South Peninsula High School who are also in the national finals.
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