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The quality of Physical Science education in rural South African schools is a matter of significant concern, particularly in the context of the country's development goals aimed at uplifting education standards in these areas and nurturing a more skilled workforce. Physical Science plays a pivotal role in enhancing scientific literacy across the nation. This qualitative study, framed within Vygotsky's sociocultural theory, sought to identify the challenges faced by Physical Science educators in improving Grade 12 results in rural schools in Vuwani. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and classroom observations involving a purposive selection of ten Physical Science educators from among 49 schools within the district. Thematic analysis was applied to the collected data, yielding insightful interpretations. The findings, primarily from interview responses, reveal that Physical Science educators in Vuwani grapple with various challenges. These challenges encompass resource scarcity, excessive workloads, inadequate support from school management teams (SMT), insufficient training when curricula change, overcrowded classrooms, and suboptimal learning environments. This study underscores the importance of fostering collaborative partnerships between schools, local communities, and business sectors. In particular, it recommends that businesses extend their support to rural schools, addressing infrastructure deficiencies and resource shortages. Such collaborative initiatives between government entities and businesses can enhance the overall quality of education in rural areas, ultimately mitigating the skills deficit and contributing to the nation's socioeconomic development goals.

Various existing studies have established the multi-faceted nature of social inequalities in South Africa. The social inequalities also segregate schools into urban and rural schools, with adequate or lack of infrastructure influencing learners' performances in various South African schools. Hence, school principals are expected to manage the available resources to attain curriculum delivery and the whole school's performance. This qualitative study explored principals' perspectives on managing uneven school resources to achieve the goals and objectives of the education system. This study adopted an interpretive paradigm to understand the voices of 20 rural school principals in semi-structured interviews. The principals were purposively selected from 20 rural schools in King Cetshwayo district in KwaZulu-Natal. The audio-recorded interviews were thematically analysed to generate themes for findings and discussion. Findings revealed that most rural schools need more adequate school resources, and the principals need more support to attain quality curriculum delivery in schools adequately. The principals also lamented the high expectations placed on their schools for the academic excellence of their learners. Thus, the contents of each subject curriculum could not be efficiently unpacked and delivered to learners. The study, therefore, recommends improvement in resource provision to rural schools. At the same time, principals should be capacitated on effectively managing available school resources to achieve desired and efficient curriculum implementation in rural schools.