South Africa - Reports

Mail & Guardian: White SA school goes mixed-race
POTGIETERSRUS gets up early. By 7am on Wednesday -- the last day of racial exclusivity for Potgietersrus Primary School -- four little girls were already on duty in their fluorescent orange vests. At the blast of the whistle they would raise their stop-signs to enable another barefoot blond child to trot across the road, their routine unshakeable despite the near-total absence of cars on the tree-lined street ....
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Shaun Goodbrand (SA)
"South Africa seems quite tolerant about going barefoot. The indigenous Africans have had it as part of their culture, white Afrikaans primary (elementary) school children go to school barefoot until they are about 10, rugby (the White national game) is played barefoot by everyone until they reach high school"

FanTim (SA)
"Up to Std. 5(Grade 7) I only wore shoes to school on about 5 days out of the whole year.  I dont think I have suffered any adverse effects from this except some frosty toes every once in a while ;)

Mark Richardson (SA)
"Neither my wife, nor any of her family and schoolmates wore shoes until they reached high school, at around age 13, when they moved from what was a small village school to attend boarding schools. They would have thought it very strange to have to wear shoes.
As I sometimes drive through Transkei and see children going to school I think that they are mainly barefoot. It would be so normal that I doubt that it is something anyone would remark on.
Today, I think that all junior school rugby is played barefoot. I know that this was so in my son's case. Definitely not the case for hockey and cricket though."

South African schools