From “Boy-Government” and “Student-Government” to “Learner-Government”: The Best of Both Worlds?

In the history of South African education there have been three contrasting attempts to incorporate learners into the authority structures of schools, namely: “boy-government” (prefect system), “student-government” (Student Representative Councils (SRCs)) and “learner-government” (Representative Councils of Learners (RCLs)). This article traces the historical development of these traditions in governance in South African schools. Against this background, it proffers a historical analysis of these traditions to show that the phrase “learner representative council” is at a crossroads, that is, it is being stretched and pulled in different directions in post-apartheid South Africa. It points out that “student-government” was born out of the rejection of the unpopular “boy-government”. It also provides a critical analysis of the attempt of the national Guides for Representative Councils of Learners (Guides for RCLs) (DoE 1999) to blend the “prefect” and “SRC” traditions in order to strengthen democracy at school level. In doing so, it argues that the Guides for RCLs undermine democratic SRCs developed in the anti-apartheid education struggle. In the end, the article defends the “student-government” tradition because of its potential to educate for democratic citizenship in post-apartheid South African schools.     

Globalisation and the curriculum: Proposals for the integration of education and training in South Africa

In South Africa, the post-apartheid government has committed itself to an integrated approach to education and training. This article addresses South African policy debates, illustrating that global trends such as integration are shaped by significant local influences in the production of specific policy positions. The integration debate in South Africa reflects both equity and human resource development concerns, and is more fully developed in adult basic education and training than in formal post-compulsory education. The article analyses the proposals for integration as part of a complex policy agenda, arguing that the implementation of integration proposals will not be straightforward. This is due to the genesis of the integration debate in training rather than both education and training, its assumptions about economic development, and the contested nature of the policy process.     

Teacher education in post-apartheid South Africa: Navigating a way through competing state and global imperatives for change

This article focuses on teacher education in post-apartheid South Africa. It argues that the restructuring and reorganization of teacher education is at the nexus of the axes of tension created by national and global imperatives for change. Along with the dismantling of apartheid and the transition to a free and democratic state in 1994 came the urgent need for social reconstruction, democratization, redress, social justice, and equity. At the same time, and as part of a global context, the country needed global competitiveness, human capital development, global skills, international standards, and accountability. These competing modernist discourses have informed the design and orientation of the National Qualifications Framework and national curriculum that took place in parallel with, and simultaneous to, the restructuring and reform of teacher education. This article reviews literature pertinent to understanding the post-apartheid transformation in South African education in general and teacher education in particular. It concludes that policy makers have managed to navigate a way through the axis of tension created by opposed orientations to transformation. A more equitable and improved system of teacher education has been achieved but critical issues of teacher quality and quantity have emerged which urgently need resolution.     

Balancing Economic and other Discourses in the Internationalization of Higher Education in South Africa

Since the end of the apartheid era in South Africa, “internationalization” of higher education has been a popular theme as the country takes its place as a regional leader in education and research in sub-Saharan Africa. However, competing discourses of internationalization have produced economic and moral dilemmas rather than the realization of philanthropic academic aims. The process of internationalizing higher education in South Africa has been greatly compromised by under-funding and over-crowding of post-secondary education institutions in the country.     

Skills development and structural change: Possibilities for and limitations of redressing structural racial inequalities in South Africa

Improving structural racial equality for historically-disadvantaged Black South Africans, including low-skilled and unemployed adults and youths, is a pertinent challenge for the South African government during the ongoing transition from apartheid capitalism to post-apartheid capitalism. Within the framework of the National Skills Development Strategy (NSDS), the introduction of “learnerships” and “learning programmes”, which include structured learning programmes, learnerships, apprenticeships and skills programmes, has had some impact. But emerging theoretical perspectives assert that apartheid structural racial inequalities persist and that structural reform is imperative. Opposing positions translate into two perspectives on social transition: either capitalism can be de-racialised, or capitalism in South Africa should be dismantled in order to de-racialise it. After a review of relevant literature and governmental documents, the author identifies five structural and pedagogical barriers as likely causes for low completion rates of skills development courses and concludes that structural reform needs more favourable political and economic conditions in order to be successful.     

Dimensions of higher education and the public good in South Africa

The focus is on the micro-possibilities of student capabilities formation as the end of public-good higher education, rather than on a systems or organizations approach more commonly found in discussions of the public good and higher education. This does not discount other valuable public-good ends. Using South Africa as a global South context, a capability-based approach to the public good of higher education is proposed for its humanizing ethic, attention to fair opportunities, and participation in terms of what students are able to do and to be in and through higher education. A capability frame is complemented by thinking about decoloniality and epistemic justice to help identify central higher education capabilities. The three proposed intersecting capability dimensions are as follows: personhood self-formation, epistemic contribution, and sufficiency of economic resources, intended to guide university practices and policy interventions in the direction of the public good. By populating the space of the public good with capabilities, a shift is made away from micro-economics which see the public good as a reductionist space of commodities and human capital development. Higher education is rather understood as having both instrumental and intrinsic value, generating an alternative logic to that of neo-liberalism, and an individualist ontology of competition and untrammeled markets. The pressures of the global context are acknowledged so that the public good is understood as both “ideal-aspirational” but also “practical-feasible” in the light of local South African conditions. An expanded capability-based framing would contribute to reducing higher education inequalities as a public-good and public-accountable contribution by universities.     

Distributed leadership in South Africa: yet another passing fad or a robust theoretical tool for investigating school leadership practice?

Distributed leadership, while an established concept in the international literature on education leadership, is slowly gaining prominence in post-apartheid South Africa. This is primarily due to its normative and representational appeal. However, of concern is that the concept has become a catch-all phrase to describe any form of devolved or shared leadership and is being espoused as ‘the answer’ to the country’s educational leadership woes. Drawing on a South African publications-based doctoral study of distributed teacher leadership (Grant 2010. “Distributed Teacher Leadership: Troubling the Terrain.” Unpublished PhD diss., University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg) for its evidence, this article argues for a theoretically robust form of distributed leadership conceptualised as socio-cultural practice and framed as a product of the joint interactions of school leaders, followers and aspects of their situation (Gronn 2000. “Distributed Properties: A New Architecture for Leadership.” Educational Management and Administration 28 (3): 317–338; Spillane, Halverson and Diamond 2004. “Towards a Theory of Leadership Practice: A Distributed Perspective.” Journal of Curriculum Studies 36 (1): 3–34; Spillane 2006. Distributed Leadership. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass). It endorses a sequential distributed leadership framing for the South African context and calls for further empirical studies which interrogate the complex practices of distributed school leadership. For without this theoretically robust work, the article argues, distributed leadership is likely to be relegated to the large pile of redundant leadership theories and become a passing fad.     

Education in Post-apartheid South Africa: Some lessons from Zimbabwe

The racial inequalities of the Rhodesian education system are outlined. The paper then assesses the conservativereforms of the transitional governmentof 'Zimbabwe-Rhodesia' (1978-80), and the more radical approach pursued since independence. A case study is made of nine secondary schools in Harare. The policies pursued are compared with the interim measures of the South African government since 1990, and lessons derived from the Zimbabwean experience are applied to the situation which will be inherited by the first post-apartheid government in South Africa. A new education strategy must seek to avoid the replacement of racial divisions with class divisions. It will need to re-think what the State can provide, and formulate strategies for funding what the State cannot provide, in order to minimise inequalities of opportunity.     

The changing demography of academic staff at higher education institutions (HEIs) in South Africa

In this work, we contribute to the debate on the transformation of higher education institutions (HEIs) in post-apartheid South Africa by examining the changing demography of academic staff bodies at 25 South African HEIs from 2005 to 2015. We use empirical data to provide initial insights into the changing racial profiles of academic staff bodies across age, gender and rank and then summarise our findings into a transformation ‘scorecard’ which provides an indication of how all racial groups in the country are performing in terms of their representation in higher education. Initial results indicate that most academics in South Africa are middle-aged (between 35 and 54) but an ageing trend is evident, particularly among white academics. In terms of gender, males marginally outnumber females, although we estimate an equitable distribution to be attained within the next 5 years. Significantly, the data indicate that there is an upwards trajectory of black African academics across all rankings from 2005 to 2015 and a concomitant downward trajectory of white academics across all rankings. Both Indian and coloured academics most closely represent their national population representation. Our transformation ‘scorecard’ indicates that the demography of academic staff at higher education institutions in South Africa is changing and will continue to change in the future, particularly within the next 20 years if current trends continue.     

Michael Young and the curriculum field in South Africa

The paper addresses the question of what we should make of Michael Young’s recent work with respect to curriculum theory by considering the particular case of South African curriculum reform. The paper thus traces two trajectories: the evolution of Michael Young’s ideas over time and South African curriculum reform in the post-apartheid period. The paper shows how the two trajectories have run in parallel, not least because of Young’s ongoing involvement and interest in South Africa. Three broad periods in Young’s career are identified: the new sociology of education period; a middle period where he engaged in substantial policy work, focusing predominantly on the relation between schooling and the economy; and his social realist phase, where much of his work has focused on an educational notion of specialized knowledge: ‘powerful knowledge’. The possibilities and limitations of this notion as it has been taken up in the research literature, and in relation to the South African case, are explored.     

The contradictions of scientific management as a mode of controlling teachers'' work in black secondary schools: South Africa

Using teaching as a labour process, this paper shows how teachers' work is controlled by the state. By using data collected from the Lebowa bantustan in South Africa, the analysis focuses on structural/material constraints on teachers' work; how scientific management has been transferred from industrial corporations to South African black schools as a post-1976 reform strategy, to bring control over teachers and students at a time when the system of education of blacks was characterised by massive student and teacher protests. However, contradictory developments emerged whereby teachers responded and resisted these controls in a variety of ways in different work contexts. Since the research was conducted in the late 1980's, the paper seeks to discuss how widespread scientific management ideas are in the post-apartheid era.     

“They Even Speak Tsotsitaal with Their Teachers at School”: The Use (and Abuse) of African Urban Youth Languages in Educational Contexts

Abstract

African Urban Youth Languages (AUYLs) are increasingly coming under the spotlight of linguists and sociolinguists across the continent, who are investigating their relationship to standard and/or vernacular varieties. Simultaneously, they are being discussed by educators and education researchers, although little has yet been published in this critical area. The difficulties for educators posed by students speaking “non-standard” varieties has been highlighted by recent studies investigating literacy and language in the classroom. This article presents an overview of some of the challenges posed to education by AUYLs. It considers recent studies of AUYLs in educational contexts from around the continent. It then presents data from South Africa which highlights different orientations towards the South African AUYL “Tsotsitaal” in educational domains. The argument is made that the position of both teachers and pupils is vulnerable, and that the legitimacy of the distinction between standard language and urban vernacular language needs to be reconsidered.     

Multicultural education,gender and social justice: liberal feminist misgivings

This chapter argues the need to acknowledge the limitations of multiculturalism in approaching social justice in South African education, in the face of the understandable post-apartheid enthusiasm for multiculturalism. Examining policy documents and public discourse about the concept and implementation of multiculturalism as well as the concept of culture itself, the authors raises a tension between multiculturalism, on the one hand, and the frequently proclaimed policy goals of promoting a non-sexist order and of teaching critical thinking in a culture of human rights, on the other. Indeed, it is suggested that an uncritical enthrallment to multiculturalism is more likely to prejudice the education of girls by preventing a critique of oppressive practices that undermine their interests and rights. While the political liberalism that preoccupies political philosophy in the West offers little guidance on dealing with difference to countries like South Africa, the emergence of a liberal universalist feminism offers greater scope for educational intervention against oppressive practices wrongly defended in the name of multiculturalism.     

The Rhetorical Success of Thabo Mbeki's 1996 “I Am an African” Address

Thabo Mbeki's 1996 “I Am an African” address, delivered on the occasion of the Constitutional Assembly's passage of a new constitution for a truly democratic South Africa, was successful and memorable. Three strategies account for its success: its use of what Bakhtin termed “stylization,” which allowed the rhetor to invest the speech with the aura of John F. Kennedy; its strategic shifting from the first-person singular to the first-person plural; and, most important, its construction of a narrative history of South Africa that, modeled on Scripture, celebrates the South African people's past, present, and future.     

From Policy to Practice: Curriculum reform in South African education

An important development in the post-apartheid South Africa was a departure from apartheid education through an outcomes-based curriculum reform. This resulted in several structural and policy tensions within the system. This paper highlights how these tensions have played themselves out and shows how government and stakeholders have addressed the challenges emanating from them. The paper argues that the tensions that dominated the post-apartheid curriculum reform have resulted in a significant paradigm shift focused on reclaiming knowledge and cognition in the classroom as expressed in the new revisionism in curriculum debate. From a policy point of view, it argues that the South African experience demonstrates how the pursuit of grand philosophies and ideals such as OBE and curriculum 2005 requires, at both macro and micro, systemic and institutional levels, generally and at the level of detail, a great deal of technical and political skills that cannot be achieved overnight. This calls for realism and pragmatism in school reform by focusing attention not only on what schools in society stand for but also on what they can realistically do and achieve, given their legacies and the particular circumstances in which they operate.     

A Theoretical Framework for Professional Development in a South African University

The changing context of higher education both internationally and in South Africa has presented challenges to lecturers that have led in some institutions to the introduction of accredited professional development courses for academics. Such courses for university lecturers are relatively new in South Africa. This paper reports on research in progress on a Post Graduate Certificate in Higher Education and Training course offered at Rhodes University in South Africa. It highlights some important questions that have arisen on the ways in which the theoretical framework of the course has or has not met the needs of diverse groups of lecturers within the specific South African context. A central theme of the course is that of the critically reflective practitioner. Lecturers are encouraged to explore the ontological and epistemological underpinnings of their disciplines and to examine the philosophical assumptions of their espoused theories about teaching and learning as well as their teaching practice. The theoretical framework has been found to be most successful for more experienced academics. However, the author raises some important questions regarding the suitability of this framework in relation to the specific post‐apartheid context in which the course operates, specifically whether the course prepares lecturers to open up both “actual” and “epistemological” access to all the students at the university.     

Rehabilitating a whiteness disgraced: Afrikaner white talk in post‐apartheid South Africa

This paper is part of a longer work on whiteness in post‐apartheid South Africa, which analyzes the discourses resistant to transformation in the country, labeled “white talk.” Based on a discourse analysis of the 2001 letters to the editor of Rapport newspaper, a national Afrikaans Sunday newspaper, this paper focuses on aspects of “white talk” within Afrikaans speaking South Africa.

Afrikaner whiteness has an affinity with subaltern whiteness, in that Afrikaners contended with the more powerful forces of the British Empire throughout their history. As a resistant whiteness, the whiteness of the Afrikaner has historically been rolled into ethnic/nationalistic discourse. The current moment in South African history presents a crisis to Afrikaner identity similar to the time of dislocation that saw the original discursive suturing of Afrikaner identity into nationalism. But now the worldview has imploded; Apartheid is the “other” of the New South Africa; Afrikaners are perceived to be in need of “rehabilitation.” Certain ethnic anxieties are pervasive, and the paper explores four of these. White talk in this context attempts to do two things: (1) to re‐inscribe the Afrikaner mythology that secured a special place for the Afrikaner in the political, economic, and social life of the country, so that the ground gained through the apartheid era of systematic Afrikaner advancement is not lost in the new social order, while (2) presenting Afrikanerdom as compatible with the New South Africa.     

Language,Africanisation, and Identity Politics at a South African University

After centuries of “Eurocentric” linguistic ideology, the South African government has formulated African language development and multilingualism as one priority in the education system. While only English, and decreasingly Afrikaans, are the only “established” languages of instruction at tertiary level, most universities in the country have revised their language policies in order to show commitment to South Africa’s evident multilingualism. This article provides a critical analysis of particular language and identity politics in one of the leading tertiary institutions of the country. The theoretical framework is based on a critical sociolinguistic approach that draws attention to polarizing identity politics in relation to language policy, planning and implementation. Methodologically grounded in ethnography, the article has a two-fold perspective. First, it analyses particular language policy rhetoric at the University on focus and argues that its essentialist approach to Africanisation triggers contested identity politics. Second, the article provides insights into the developments of specific implementations, pointing to ideological as well as practical challenges at the university on focus.     

Integrated Education and Black Development in Post-apartheid South Africa: Critical analyses

With the integration of the education system in liberated South Africa, social development expectations should be justifiably high, especially for the country's long-oppressed black majority. The concretisation of these expectations is being, or will be, determined by a myriad of converging and diverging possibilities and difficulties. This article focuses on the problems of education and development in post-apartheid South Africa, with a sustained emphasis on the importance of looking beyond the current political triumph. The new areas of constant and consistent focus must become, the author proposes, the disturbingly uneven terrains of educational attainment and long-term socio-economic development. By stressing the urgency of these cases, the article highlights actual possibilities as well as the magnitude of hindering factors in educational development that are still affecting millions of lives in the new South Africa. The article ends with a call for the pragmatic reconstitution of South Africa's development education actualities to make this country a prosperous space for all South Africans now and into the future.     

History curriculum and teacher training: shaping a democratic future in post-apartheid South Africa?

ABSTRACT

Issues of transitional justice are central to countries moving away from identity-based conflict. Research tends to focus on the most well-known forms of transitional justice, like truth commissions. Far less attention has been given to education as a form of transitional justice, and even less to teacher professional development, even though education is central to signalling the new society and teachers are expected to become agents of change in their classrooms. This article focusses on history curriculum change in post-apartheid South Africa. We show how the post-apartheid South African government developed a human rights-based history curriculum but failed to support teachers to implement it. Aspects of these inadequacies included a failure to take into account the de-skilling of a large segment of the teaching population under apartheid and teachers’ personal legacies of that era. Through a review of the teacher professional development programme, Facing the Past, this article demonstrates the possibility to implement teacher training programmes attuned to the particular needs of a transitional justice environment.