 | Face-to-face Initial Teacher Education Degree Programme at the University of Durban-Westville, South Africa (CIE, 2002, 57 p.) |
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Chapter 1: Introduction
At the beginning of 2001 the University of Durban Westville (UDW), School of Educational Studies was faced with the decision of discontinuing undergraduate pre-service/initial teacher education programmes for first year new entry students.
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"It is not financially viable to offer the programmes to so few students," argued the university financial administrators. (Financial considerations) "We need to keep alive the innovative curriculum that the new Bachelor of Education programme offers," argued the School's curriculum designers. There is a glint of pride as staff fondly refer to the programme as the BAGET degree (Bachelor of General Education and Training), the term coined before the nationally agreed upon uniform nomenclature. "We have worked for years on redesigning the teacher education curriculum so that it reflects our best understanding of how to develop teachers as professionals. This new curriculum reflects a culmination of the School's research, evaluation studies and reflections on past experiences. The curriculum also reflects a close harmony with the new policies on teacher education. The new programme promotes the development of teachers with a combination of academic, professional and reflexive competences. We cannot not offer this curriculum. We need to keep it on the curriculum books." (Curriculum policy imperatives) "What are students' experiences of the undergraduate teacher education programmes within the School?" asked the external evaluators of the programme. (Students' experiences) "How does the curriculum address the underpreparedness of students in terms of their subject/content-based knowledge? Does this course address the needs of preparing teachers to work in multilingual and diverse teaching contexts?" (Social and political imperatives) "We need to be aware that those university lecturers who cannot teach at the postgraduate level within the School will most likely be out of a job, if the undergraduate programme is discontinued," argued the School management. "Can the enrollments of the postgraduate programme cross-subsidize the dwindling numbers of the pre-service programme?" (Staffing/management issues) |
In the early 1990's the student intake into the undergraduate degree programme was around 300. In 1999 the student intake for the redesigned undergraduate degree programme was 16. In the year 2000 only 4 students enrolled for the new degree which was launched under the officially South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA) registered new programme of the School. Only 8 applications had been received to enroll for the new Bachelor of Education (undergraduate) teacher education programme in 2001. By contrast (see Table 1) the school has seen a growing intake of postgraduate students. The School currently (2001) has 45 doctoral students.
Table 1: Student enrollment across PRESET and Continuing Teacher Education levels/qualifications
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1991 |
1992 |
1993 |
1994 |
1995 |
1996 |
1997 |
1998 |
1999 |
2000 |
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PRESET | ||||||||||
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B.PAED |
326 |
332 |
296 |
296 |
240 |
233 |
218 |
132 |
16 |
6 |
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HDE |
138 |
46 |
38 |
33 |
33 |
36 |
37 |
48 |
48 |
105 |
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CONTINUING EDUCATION/RESEARCH DEGREE | ||||||||||
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B.Ed (HON) |
20 |
37 |
52 |
32 |
46 |
17 |
32 |
123 |
30 |
45 |
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D.ED |
2 |
1 |
4 |
1 |
1 |
7 |
6 |
3 |
17 |
48 |
What are the forces influencing the declining numbers within the teacher education pre-service programme at UDW? What is the nature of the curriculum that was designed in response to the changing policy environment of teacher education reform in South Africa? How did students experience this curriculum? What could sustain the institution to continue being a provider of quality pre-service teacher education?
This case study of teacher education at the University of Durban-Westville, a historically Black university, attempts to portray the tensions around curriculum design, development and implementation in the climate of post-apartheid South Africa. The intersecting and competing forces of financial considerations, curriculum imperatives, managerial, staffing issues and social and political considerations, all abound in this case study. Each of these forces have pushed and pulled the teacher education provider in opposite and complementary directions.
The chapter intends to reveal that teacher education reform needs to strive towards a balancing of both "reconceptualisation" and "restructuring" (Wideen and Grimmet: 1995) concerns. The former concerns (reconceptualisation) prioritise the need to re-look at what and how teacher education is organised, managed and experienced by the staff and students engaged in the curriculum programme at institutional level. The latter (restructuring) focuses on the development of the systemic forces within the broader society which influence the pattern of relationships between different teacher educational providers, as well as between the teacher education institutions and the teaching/learning sites (e.g. schools) where student teachers practice as novices and then as qualified teachers.
Whilst the former concern (reconceptualising) firmly places the responsibility for reform on the shoulders of the providers of teacher education within the institutions themselves, the latter (restructuring) focuses on the broader political framework that needs to be developed by the managers and administrators of teacher education within the national and provincial Departments of Education.
The paper will argue that the curriculum expertise and resources of this institution are likely to be lost to the teacher education terrain if no significant systemic intervention is made to recognise its contribution to the development of creative and innovative approaches to teacher development in the country.
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