No spark, Just poor teaching.

Our first two years at SPARK were great however this year has been the worst.

My daughter has been struggling all year and despite sending several emails to her teachers and leadership, absolutely nothing was done on their part to assist. The more emails I sent, the more I felt my child was being neglected. They barely check the kid's books and their feedback is generic printed out slips with a blank area to fill in the child's name.

My daughter was given a 0 on her report for a project she submitted (on time). Firstly, I don't understand how a teacher can give a scholar 0 without raising any concerns with the parent but had she just called or sent an email letting me know what is happening, I would have told her that the project was submitted and that she should double-check.

She's also been struggling with Isizulu all year and not once did her teacher call/email to let me know what exactly the problem was or to give feedback on the effort we've been putting in at home. Whenever I requested an explanation, all I got was another generic email saying our kids can't read or write isiZulu (I know it's generic because another parent received the exact same response).

Even so, we practiced more, did all the work but it was hardly ever checked and when it was, my child was berated for not knowing certain words by her teacher.

My daughter's friend wet her pants in the same teacher's class because the teacher wouldn't let her go to the bathroom. She did not even bother to assist the scholar after finding out what happened. Then our kids are somehow expected to learn, grow and be free to ask questions in that environment.

Teachers also don't send home marked test scripts and rubrics for projects so we don't even know how they got to the marks written on the report card or if the marks are accurate. There are also no textbooks or workbooks, just a bunch of random printouts that are sent to parents so that we can prepare kids for assessments. It's not the worst school, but if you want to give your kids a fighting chance, I wouldn't suggest SPARK. They will not help nurture and grow your child's potential.