Responses The Department and representatives of the FET College made the following responses to the issues expressed above: . The issue of employing unqualified lecturers was a national challenge which affects all provinces. It was said that most qualified lecturers were attracted to lucrative packages that were offered by the private sector and the department could not meet the salary demands of these lecturers. . The provincial department of education was not allocated an adequate amount of funds for the recapitalisation of all FET Colleges in the province. The FET Colleges that received the least allocation for recapitalisation submitted poor business plans to the department. . The Committee was informed that the merger process contributed positively to the development of some FET Colleges that previously lacked sufficient resources. The challenges of mergers are experienced at human resources level where staff members have different opinions on issues. . The department acknowledged that it had not created a database where details of all graduates and drop-outs are stored and this posed a challenge in terms of tracing their further progress. . The Committee was informed that students in FET Colleges were encouraged to choose programmes that were suitable to their needs. The main challenge with this is that many students struggled to find employment in their field after completing their studies since their choices were not in line with the demands of the labour market in the province. . The reason for the closure of Modjadji FET College was due to poor enrolment and throughput rate in the College and it was stated that the public was informed of the decision. . It was stated that the criteria used by NSFAS to award bursaries to students of low income was not effective. The majority of students in Letaba FET College are very poor and they require a full bursary for their studies. Most of the bursaries awarded to students were top sliced. . It was said that the content of the NC(V) programme is academic and the majority of students, especially those completing Grade 9 could not cope with the standard of the programme.