Full Description
18 years after the first democratic elections education in South Africa is still in a state of crisis. Failure to deliver textbooks, limited support available to schools, ineffective districts, under-qualified teachers, poor matriculation results, and low performance in national and international assessments is symptomatic of a fundamental malaise in education. And it is the poor, marginalised and the disadvantaged who are most affected. For those who have access to private and 'better quality' public schools, there is no crisis!
This book considers these issues by reviewing selected large-scale interventions to improve education quality in South African schools. These interventions include the District Development Support Programme (DDSP), the Education Quality Improvement Partnership Programme (EQUIP), the IMBEWU programme, the Integrated Education Program (IEP), the Khanyisa School Programme, the Learning for Living (LFL) Project, and the Quality Learning Project (QLP). It locates these interventions by providing a chronology of education policy development in South Africa since 1994 as well as engaging with key debates about the notion of education quality. Furthermore, it invites policy-makers to critically review and reflect on the changes to improve education quality in South Africa since 1994. By bringing together academics, policy-makers and practitioners to reflect on education development the book sheds light on the continuous but elusive search for quality education for all. In so doing, the book provides a basis for a critical conversation about the history of education change in post-apartheid South Africa, and the implications for interventions aimed at improving education quality.
Contents
Policy debates and issues: context, contests and contradictions: An overview of education policy change in post-apartheid South Africa; approaches to education quality in South Africa Public sector reforms and policy making: a case of education in an emerging developmental South Africa; personal reflections on policy and school quality in South Africa: when the politics of disgust meets the politics of distrust; quality interventions in South Africa: problems and possibilities the change balance sheet in South African education: a post-apartheid assessment; the education quality improvement partnership programme: a whole school development framework; the education quality improvement partnership programme; the imbewu I and ii projects; improving learning and learner achievement in South Africa through the district office: the case of the district development support programme; the case of the district development support programme: robustness of methodology and approach; the quality learning project: an integrated theory-driven intervention quality learning project: an overall evaluation perspective; the learning for living project 2000 to 2004: a book-based approach to the learning of language in South African primary schools; the learning for living project: using large-scale intervention to demonstrate school improvement: the iep project in three provinces; the iep project in three provinces Khanyiso school programme: a programme of the Limpopo department of education; Khanyiso school programme; reflections from policy makers on school quality reform; a critical cross-case analysis of seven longitudinal education intervention projects in South Africa; underperformance in the schooling system: the need for improved planning that focuses on the key policy challenges; improving quality in education; reflection on education quality from an international development agency perspective.
