When Sipho Manzini finished matric in 2007, he dreamed of a career studying rocks. Today, the Mfuleni High School teacher is being celebrated as one of South Africa’s public service trailblazers — the creator of an artificial intelligence-powered platform that is quietly transforming how schools run.
Manzini is the developer of WebAdmin, a digital platform that helps educators streamline administrative tasks, improve organisation and integrate technology into their daily work, SAnews reports. The innovation earned him the bronze award in the category of Innovations Harnessing Technology for Frontline Services at the 2025 National Batho Pele and Innovation Awards, along with the Special Ministerial Award for Public Sector Trailblazers. The awards, hosted by the Department of Public Service and Administration and the Centre for Public Service Innovation, honour public servants who go beyond the call of duty.
From a farm near White River to Stellenbosch
Manzini’s road to the awards stage was anything but direct. Born and raised in Mbombela, he grew up on a farm near White River in Mpumalanga and attended a farm primary school. With no high school nearby, he relocated to the village of Mgaduzweni to complete his secondary education.
He went on to study geology at Stellenbosch University, where a programming module in his final year sparked an unexpected passion. After graduating in 2016 and a short stint in industry, he enrolled for a Postgraduate Certificate in Education in 2020 — a decision that changed the course of his career and, as it turns out, the working lives of hundreds of teachers.
Two years of building, one big idea
Arriving in the classroom, Manzini was struck by how little school administration had changed since his own school days: paper-heavy, manual systems that made the work disorganised and hard to manage. Rather than accept the status quo, he spent nearly two years building a solution.
“It was not a fully fledged idea from the start. It was very small. It just kept growing and growing until I had a fully developed digital system,” he recalls.
The result is a platform that gives educators digital workstations on their smartphones or laptops. Integrated with a customised smart card — also developed by Manzini — WebAdmin lets teachers handle class registers, staff attendance, learner activities and a range of other administrative functions from one central hub, dramatically reducing reliance on paperwork.
From one school to thirteen
What began at Mfuleni High School has grown into a wider district initiative. The platform is now used in 13 schools across the Metro North District, with more than 250 teachers actively using it to streamline their workflow and free up time for what matters most: teaching.
Manzini admits that persuading colleagues to abandon long-established paper systems remains his biggest challenge. But with national recognition behind him and a growing community of educators on board, the geologist-turned-teacher has already proved his central thesis — that South African classrooms can be laboratories of innovation, too.
Photo: commons.wikimedia.org
Leave a Reply