4.5 Placement

As has been pointed out earlier, the teaching practice schools are now basically in 7 out of the 10 districts. The College no longer places students in the three mountain districts. Student teachers were asked to indicate whether or not they participated in the placement activity and table 1 shows their answers.

Table 1: Who Decided on the Trainees' Placements

There were 108 (90%) respondents who indicated that they played an active role in choosing the schools they want to go to. This information is consistent with what happened in the past; student teachers still play a significant role in choosing schools in which they want to practise. An insignificant number 11 (9.2%) reported that the TP Coordinator contributed to the selection of practice schools. In effect, the College relinquishes control over the placements to the students; schools are chosen for personal and/or geographic reasons rather than whether they meet any College criteria for good teaching.

The question of placement was taken further by asking students to indicate the district in which they were placed. During the 1998 academic year, the majority of the students (29.2%) were placed in the Maseru district. This percentage is not surprising since the College is located in this district. Otherwise, the distribution of student teachers by district indicates that Leribe had 22.5%, Berea 15%, Mafeteng 12.5%, Mohale's Hoek 8.3%, Butha-Buthe 6.7% while Quthing had lowest percent (5.8%). It would seem therefore that on the whole students prefer to be in the Maseru district since the majority of them were placed in Maseru.