{"id":883575,"date":"2026-11-11T12:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-11-11T10:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=883575"},"modified":"2026-11-11T11:49:11","modified_gmt":"2026-11-11T09:49:11","slug":"the-afrikaans-public-school-that-was-once-the-best-performing-in-the-country-and-produced-the-ceo-of-the-largest-private-security-company-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/education\/883575\/the-afrikaans-public-school-that-was-once-the-best-performing-in-the-country-and-produced-the-ceo-of-the-largest-private-security-company-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"The Afrikaans public school that was once the best-performing in the country and produced the CEO of the largest private security company in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Ho\u00ebrskool Florida in Gauteng has achieved years of strong results among its learners and produced the man who dominated both international rugby and the private security industry, Wahl Bartmann.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The school was founded in 1944 and opened its doors to learners in 1946, initially as a dual-medium English and Afrikaans school.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eleven years after its founding in 1955, the school officially adopted Afrikaans as its medium of instruction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the beginning, Florida Ho\u00ebrskool had only 15 staff members, which increased to 28 by the time it shifted its medium of instruction to support its 635 students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since then, the school has gone through several major upgrades and renovations, with amenities such as a music centre being added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1958, the Hendrik van Coller School Hall was unveiled and was significantly enlarged in 1994 to accommodate the school’s growing number of learners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2013, the school completed construction of the largest indoor shooting range in South Africa and the second largest on the continent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Florida Ho\u00ebrskool’s history is still present in the school today, such as through the nickname given to the school’s pupils, “florries” (flowers).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The school’s crest has a rose at its centre, and it had a garden of over 1,000 roses in its early years, with each pupil assigned a rose bush to care for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In academics, the school has historically excelled, producing the highest number of top matric achievers in South Africa in 2007.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ho\u00ebrskool Florida was also previously ranked both first and second nationally for academics, alongside several provincial distinctions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The school has maintained its strong academic performance to date, with a 99.5% pass rate in its 2025 matric cohort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

80% of its learners also achieved bachelor’s passes in 2025, while one learner achieved eight distinctions and two more achieved six.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A notable alumnus<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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One of the school’s most notable alumni is Wahl Bartmann, a former Springbok rugby flanker and the current CEO of Fidelity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bartmann matriculated from Florida Ho\u00ebrskool in 1982 and moved on to play for the Transvaal Rugby Union, which was nicknamed “transwahl” at the time due to Bartmann’s dominance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During his career, he also played 79 matches for the Natal Sharks, scoring 21 tries during his time with the team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Along with provincial teams, Bartmann featured in seven test matches for the Springboks, scoring one try for the national side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was also part of the Springbok side that beat New Zealand in 1992, during a fixture in Johannesburg’s Ellis Park.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bartmann was also voted South Africa’s rugby player of the year for two consecutive years, in both 1990 and 1991.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After retiring from professional rugby, he joined his father’s private security business, Springbok Patrols, full-time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He and his siblings had all been involved in the family business prior to this, often helping during the holidays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He previously told JacarandaFM that, “During the holidays, including the December festive season, when everyone went on holiday, we worked.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bartmann soon became the Chief Executive of Springbok Patrols, which evolved into Fidelity Services Group under his leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1999, Fidelity completed the security industry’s first Black Economic Empowerment deal, forming Khulani Springbok Patrols.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was later sold to Fidelity, along with a substantial deal in 2017, where the company acquired ADT Security South Africa, becoming Fidelity ADT.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The acquisition included all of ADT’s residential and commercial operations, as well as the ADT Kusela Guarding business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This acquisition, and the purchase of Protea Coin in the cash-in-transit industry, made Fidelity Services Group the largest integrated security provider in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, Fidelity operates through 32 brands and employs over 71,000 people across its 281 points of presence in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photos of Florida Hoerskool<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Photos of Wahl Bartmann<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Florida Hoerskool has a history of academic brilliance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":883590,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2120465318820606051","_sma_facebook_post_id":"191437357620492_2269293110557754","_sma_instagram_post_id":"18047620457838797","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26526],"tags":[10181,7273,27091,16458],"class_list":["post-883575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","tag-adt","tag-fidelity","tag-florida-hoerskool","tag-wahl-bartmann"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=883575"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883575\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":883779,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883575\/revisions\/883779"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/883590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=883575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=883575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=883575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}