In 2003 the Ministry of Education – Zimbabwe, in partnership with UNICEF introduced an HIV and AIDS subject area named the AIDS Action Programme for Schools (AAPS) in secondary schools. It was mandated that AAPS be a compulsory subject area taught alongside other subjects in the curriculum as the objective of the strategy was to use the life-sustaining power of education to reduce the learners’ vulnerability to HIV infection. Despite the innovation there still exists a high prevalence of 11,1% of HIV infection among secondary school learners (UNAIDS 2010183). The high HIV infection rate prompted the study into how secondary school teachers understand, respond to and implement the AAPS. The study was founded upon the Concerns-Based Adoption Model. The sample comprised twenty teachers, four school heads and two Ministry of Education officials from the Masvingo district. Data for the qualitative case study was collected via individual interviews, focus group interviews and open-ended questionnaires. The study found that the AAPS has a low status in schools. Most teachers face numerous challenges regarding their understanding and implementation of the AAPS. It became apparent that teachers had mixed perceptions, were uninformed, ignorant, frustrated or confused regarding the AAPS policy, curriculum requirements and components. They developed negative attitudes because they lacked resources, syllabuses and prescribed textbooks, support, sufficient time for the subject area and a protective policy to cover them when they teach sensitive topics. The lack of understanding among teachers created feelings of helplessness and fear of implementing the subject area. Teachers feared loss of status among colleagues in the schools, and that they or their learners might be labelled as being HIV-positive. Teachers feared teaching orphaned and vulnerable learners in their classrooms, some of whom were infected and affected by HIV and AIDS, without being able to offer them practical solutions. Teachers who had a positive attitude attempted to adapt the curriculum while many were reluctant and ignored implementation of the subject area. Evaluated against the Concerns-Based Adoption Model, it was revealed that many of the teachers implemented the AAPS at low stages of concern and levels of use. Overall, the subject area was implemented with reluctant compliance and compliance with constraints, revealing a disjunction between policy and curriculum requirements and practice in the schools. In the light of these findings, recommendations were made with regard to the study on training and support of teachers. The Ministry of Education should become proactive in developing teachers’ knowledge and skills via significant and ongoing professional development and training for all teachers in HIV and AIDS education. School heads should exercise control and provide support with regard to curriculum implementation. Subject area coordinators, and school heads should deliberately create opportunities for staff to collaborate and exchange creative ideas and information that will improve teachers’ conceptualisation and implementation of the curriculum. Qualified and interested teachers should be appointed in a permanent capacity to teaching HIV and AIDS education. Universities should develop and provide programmes that will prepare teachers to effectively implement the curriculum of the AIDS Action Programme for Schools. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Early Childhood Education / unrestricted

ABSTRACT This thesis presents case studies of five projects that use the visual arts to effect social change in post-apartheid South Africa. Artist Proof Studio, Paper Prayers, Phumani Paper, Community Engagement at the University of Johannesburg and the AIDS Action Intervention exemplify a range of approaches to social activism through the arts that parallels the political transformation to democracy. The first case study traces the history of the community printmaking studio, Artist Proof Studio, from 1991 to 2008 in three phases: redress, reconciliation and rebuilding. Artist Proof Studio was founded in 1992 to provide visual arts training to highly creative, but previously disadvantaged individuals. The Paper Prayers for AIDS Awareness initiative was implemented as a program of the studio in 1998. Originally funded by government, the campaign reached thousands of people nationwide. Phumani Paper, a national hand papermaking programme for job creation, was founded in response to a state directive to higher education institutions to implement technology transfer and poverty alleviation initiatives. The Papermaking Research and Development Unit was established at the University of Johannesburg in 1996. The principles and approaches established through these programs are analysed in the fifth case study, the AIDS Action Intervention. This three-year intervention brings all the initiatives together in a multi-disciplinary program that applies participatory action research as well as visual arts methodologies that help catalyse meaningful social action. There are common elements running through each of the case studies that derive from the fact that each intervention was based on the democratic values of human rights and equity. Further, the methodology throughout is dialogical, consultative, and designed to facilitate participants recognizing their own voices. The idea is that practice leads to understanding and stems from a fundamental ethical principle or ideal that all human beings have the capacity to realize their potential in their own way. The central argument of these case studies is that the projects continue to survive, against significant odds, because of the power of imagination, aspiration and dreaming. I interrogate the projects’ foundational premise that participants are empowered by the creative process, which promotes a sense of pride, and generates leadership as well as income. In addition, I argue that grass-roots visual arts projects, which ordinarily go un-analysed in any systematic way, can offer a model for transforming knowledge-creation through their non-hierarchical and participatory methodologies. In sum, this thesis documents and analyses eighteen years of arts activism; it assesses the actual outcomes of the interventions against the idealistic aims on which the projects were founded, and provides a resource guide for cultural activism in South Africa. It demonstrates the dynamic possibilities that exist in the domain of development and arts education.