STIPENDS: A LIFELINE FOR DESPERATE LEARNERS OR AN EASY TARGET FOR FRAUDSTERS?
In a country plagued by severe skills shortages and an appalling unemployment rate, learnerships are an important instrument for promoting access to education and training by allowing individuals to gain valuable skills and work experience, while obtaining an accredited qualification. The stipend paid to unemployed learners, mostly from impoverished backgrounds, is a key component of this system, which is meant to assist with transport and basic living expenses, in other words, to support the learner to successfully complete the learnership.
A learner stipend is not a salary and is typically a lower amount when compared to the wage earned by a permanent employee in a comparable role. Although learner stipends are intended to cover costs such as travel and meals while on a learnership, in practice learners often spend the money on other expenses which are not linked to their learning programme at all. “I would say about 50% (if not more) of the learners I deal with have reported, at some point, not being able to attend work or training as they have spent their entire allowance, normally from about the 17th of the month,” says Robyn Murray, Project Coordinator at Progression.
The concept of “black tax” refers to, amongst other things, an obligation usually borne by young black professionals who are required to support their extended families once they have achieved some degree of financial success. However, with learnerships becoming increasingly popular, many learners are now also expected to use their stipends to contribute towards family expenses. According to Robyn, costs related to children (school fees and medical bills), supporting ill or retired parents as well as their own disability related healthcare needs top the list of reasons why so many learners run out of cash before the end of the month. Robyn shares, “Recently, one of the learners requested an advance/ loan on his stipend as he needed to get his wheelchair serviced, which cost more than half of his stipend and Progression assisted to ensure he was able to continue with the learnership.”
The sad reality is that most learners come from underprivileged backgrounds and are likely to be the only members of their households bringing in any money at all. This is also the most commonly used argument when trying to explain the primary motivation for doing a learnership – desperation. Learners rarely decide to embark on a learnership based on their interests or career goals, but rather out of a need for survival. However, it can also be argued that there are other mechanisms available to assist the poor families of learners in the form of income support for the elderly, children, war veterans and people with disabilities. While social grants may not be completely adequate in meeting all the needs of family members, they should at least serve as somewhat of a buffer, preventing a learner’s stipend from being sacrificed in the name of family obligation.
But not all learners are handing over their stipends to take care of essential expenses and support loved ones. According to Robyn, learners often spend a significant part of their monthly allowance on anything from clothing and hair weaves to recreation and alcohol. In fact, learnerships are fast becoming the latest gravy train, with learners willing to go to great lengths to secure a spot and score a monthly stipend. This includes the worrying trend of fake doctors’ letters being submitted by candidates pretending to have a disability in order to qualify for learnership programmes, which is reaching epidemic levels. Progression’s Disability Specialist, Justene Smith, confirms, “The number of fake letters we see is getting ridiculous, I would say that around 95% of the letters we are receiving now are fake and they are coming in droves!”
Another disturbing phenomenon being observed is learners who are registered on two or three different learnerships concurrently, allowing them to cash in on multiple stipends at the same time. The Progression team is seeing this more and more when trying to register a learner on the relevant SETA system, only to find that the learner has already been registered for another learnership. As it turns out, this isn’t always a deliberate act on the part of the learner – another issue is the increasing number of unethical training providers and employers who are registering individuals on learnerships without their knowledge in order to claim B-BBEE points.
However, there are definitely a fair number of learners out there who are milking the system. Sandile Khumalo, a Facilitator at Progression, recounts, “I recently had a learner in my class who I later discovered was also registered on 3 other learnerships at the time, so she was collecting 4 stipends every month! She was very aware of the rules surrounding learnerships and she had managed to work out exactly how to do the bare minimum, to not get kicked off any of the programmes.”
Clearly the learnership system has its flaws, however it’s still one of the best tools we have that addresses the skills crisis and joblessness in our country. So how do we fix it? Do we get tougher on learners? Do we restructure the stipend system? There are no easy answers, however one thing is certain – addressing these weaknesses demands a multifaceted approach, requiring focussed and coordinated efforts from all stakeholders.