Educational change in South Africa has been met with stern resistance and educators are faced with enormous difficulty in implementing new policies and curricula. Educators who have been deskilled over the years are now all of the sudden required to think ‘outside the box’ and to undergo a complete mindset change regarding the implementation of the new Further Education and Training curriculum. The new challenges educators have to cope with, heavily impacts on their day to day working conditions and subsequently their motivation. Due to the increased awareness and concern with regards to the level of educators’ motivation, this research study is based on the research question, namely how motivated educators were for the implementation of the new Further Education and Training curriculum and secondly, to explore guidelines to enhance their motivation. In an attempt to provide answers to the research problem, a qualitative research design was adopted for this research and was undertaken in two phases. In Phase 1, the data gathering consisted of semi-structured group interviews. The data was then coded into themes, sub-themes and categories and served as the basis for the interpretation of how motivated educators were for the implementation of the new Further Education and training curriculum. Four main themes emerged from the data analysis; Teachers expressed distrust in the Department of Education; Negative expectations of FET are based on the inadequate training teachers received; Teachers are de-motivated and display a low morale; Few aspects contribute to a positive attitude. Phase 2 offered recommendations, derived from the findings of Phase 1, to enhance the motivation of educators for the implementation of the new Further Education and Training curriculum. It was evident from the data analysis that educators were experiencing difficulties in coping with the heavy demand being placed on their shoulders to effectively implement the new curriculum. They displayed negative feelings towards the Department of Education who expected them to implement change within a limited time-frame. The conclusion was reached that educators are in desperate need for motivational strategies and support to enhance their emotional well-being, motivation and self-efficacy.

The culture of teaching in most South African schools is one of isolation and independence. Once individuals have qualified as teachers, there is a strong sense of getting on with the job of teaching, rather than beginning a journey of critical reflection and change. This study aims to address and contribute towards shifting this ethos and establishing a joint reflective school culture.

Amid the dearth of implementation of South Africa’s post-apartheid Language-in-education policy which encourages multilingualism and recognizes the value of instruction in the home language of learners, internal change agents initiating language change in their schools were identified in a Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) project on multilingual education. With limited policy support these change agents had sought ways of transforming language policy and practices at their schools to address the linguistic diversity of their learners. The initiative taken by these change agents to transform language policy and practice in their schools was the point of departure for the study. While the HSRC project focused broadly on the factors enabling and disabling multilingual education with a view to exploring strategies to encourage greater implementation of multilingual education, the study interrogated the work of the change agents with particular focus on the sustainability of their language change initiatives. The change agents were two school principals, a Level 1 educator (classroom practitioner) and a School Governing Body chairperson, operating in four public primary schools (one in each school) in KwaZulu-Natal. The experiences of sustaining school language change of these change agents were interrogated to elicit how and why they were able to sustain or not sustain the school language change that they had initiated in their schools. The insights drawn from this interrogation were used to deepen understanding of the process of school language change that encourages multilingual education. The data used in this study was gathered from in-depth interviews with the change agents and significant others (educators/school managers) in their schools, documentation (school language policies and notices to parents) and a Focus Group Discussion in which the change agents engaged in reflecting on their experiences of driving school language change and commenting on the process of sustaining school language change. The findings from the study revealed that all but two of the change agents were marginally successful in sustaining language change in their schools. The study revealed that school language change was a complex process involving the interplay of various factors and the existence of such factors enabled but did not guarantee the sustainability of school language change. The non-existence of some or any of the factors necessary for school language change thwarted the attempts of the change agents to sustain language change in their schools. Using the experiences of each of the change agents and the collective experience of all four change agents contextualized in qualitatively-oriented case study research and using features of grounded theory research to develop theory from case studies, the study developed a theoretical framework explicating the process of school language change led by internal agents of language change. It is suggested that the framework which seeks to deepen understanding of the complexities of the school language change process can be used as a guide to planning language change but cautions against using it as a blue print for school language change. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

The purpose of this research is to try to understand why educational restructuring since 1994 appears to have failed to achieve the government's stated objectives of development, equity, participation and redress for large sections of South African society. As the educational inequalities of the past appear to prevail beyond the arrival of the first democratic government, the hypothesis that little has fundamentally changed is explored. Although the study is firmly focussed on the period between 1994 and 1999, the legacy of the apartheid years is also examined to ensure that the research is firmly rooted in its historical context. The key area for analysis within a qualitative paradigm is the dynamic which exists between central government and its key role in planning educational reform and in policy formulation, and the provincial administrations, in whom the major responsibility for policy implementation and for effecting change on the ground, is vested. Local realities, dynamics, and constraints on the ground are explored in some depth in one of South Africa's nine provinces: the Eastern Cape. Access to the Eastern Cape's Department of Education and Culture was successfully negotiated in October 1997. As a consequence a total of 40 interviews were held with a mix of previous Ministers of Education and Culture, retired and serving Senior Civil Servants, ex members of two transitional provincial bodies, senior representatives of the main teacher unions and non-governmental organisations, school principals and school teachers. The data collected as part of this study was analysed using the grounded theory approach. The analysis indicates that educational change in the Eastern Cape will not come quickly, and that for many who were previously disadvantaged under the apartheid system little has fundamentally changed in the first five years of the new democratic South Africa.

The culture of teaching in most South African schools is one of isolation and independence. Once individuals have qualified as teachers, there is a strong sense of getting on with the job of teaching, rather than beginning a journey of critical reflection and change. This study aims to address and contribute towards shifting this ethos and establishing a joint reflective school culture.

The combined potential of two crucial factors in 1993, which afforded the promotion of socially just and ecologically sustainable ways of living, led to the instigation of this research project. The first was the imminence og our first democratic election; the second was the possible introduction of environmental education into formal education. In the light of these momentous shifts, it became apparent to me that teachers would have to radically transform their practices in order to play their part in transforming society from the dark days of apartheid into one of equity and harmony. The implications of these factors precipitated the falling into place of the rationale for my research: teachers had to look for professional development experiences which could facilitate the creation of alternative ways of thinking and doing. As a result, I approached a group of biology and geography teachers on the Cape Flats and, after protracted discussions, we decided to examine the potential of the urban environment for the teaching of ecology from the perspective of socially just and environmentally sustainable living. Out of this decision was born this study, which aimed at examining whether this process could, as a means to professional development, be a 'moment' in our journey to becoming transformative intellectuals. From this aim, the central research question emerged: Can emancipatory action research play a role in empowering teachers to become transformative intellectuals? The study consisted of five stages: - exploring the problem by reviewing the literature on the research problem; - the semi-structured interviews; - five workshops; - the 'sensing the urban environment' fieldtrip; and, - the various evaluation sessions. What we achieved during this research project, firstly, was a better understanding of our practices, which led us to seeing our roles as teachers differently and altered our pedagogical approaches. Secondly, this process developed the belief within ourselves that we, as teachers, can and should make a difference to the educational world in which we live. Lastly, this process laid the foundation for continued collaborative action by the participants. This process taught us that educational transformation is difficult and painful, and that present educational structures are not conducive to change. Nonetheless, in the historical context of this research, emancipatory action research was successful in giving us a consciousness-raising experience and closed the rhetoric-reality gap as we engaged in praxis (the practitioners developing and implementing their own curriculum). If we, as transformative intellectuals, are to engage in intellectual labour in the future, we are not only going to need to change our way of thinking and doing but will have to create an enabling infrastructure to realise this as well. We will, in addition, have to change the structures of the institutions in which we work in order to practise as transformative intellectuals.

M.Ed. / Change is inevitable. All aspects of life are all undergoing the process of change. Educational institutions are no exception to this phenomenon. The South African new found democracy has brought with it new educational policies through the South African Schools Act, which is in line with the international ways of management in schools. These new legislative policies compel schools to adopt new strategies that are prerequisite for changed and changing school climate. This study intends to find and recommend the success of schools applying the new paradigms of management styles where transformative strategies are enshrined within the leadership density and to give recommendations to the unsuccessful schools that are still logged in the old paradigms of top-down management styles. Through qualitative research, the researcher seeks to uncover the effect of these strategies in the management of schools. Research findings from this study suggest that: In schools where stakeholders sit in think tanks, opportunities are collaborated, there is culture where one mind polishes the other, there is guarantee that novel paradigms can emerge. This is a by-product of liberative management styles.

Ph.D. (Education and Curriculum Studies) / This study is about teachers’ identity shifts during the first waves of educational reform in South Africa in the post-apartheid renewal and restructuring of the education system. I studied the everyday life of four teachers in a “township” school in Gauteng Province, the industrial heartland of the country. I set out to find, over a three of years, how teachers saw themselves as professionals in this changing landscape, which included a three of new policies, including a new curriculum policy and a school governance policy. The study started with the knowledge claim that the researcher would find a shift in teacher identity, working from theories of self, specifically symbolic interactionism. I argued that in the establishment of a “post 1994” identity, as citizens and as educational practitioners, teachers have been the object of multiple social interventions. The least of these is not their adapted teaching modes and their performance as “OBE practitioners”, but as educators who took on the identity of the curriculum and its ideological intent. This was to shift teachers’ focus to learning outcomes more than content input and to see themselves as “guides by the side”, facilitators of learning, creating learning conditions that would optimise the potential of children and youth. For many teachers, the move away from being the giver or instructor to being the guide may be disturbing, I argued at the outset. I was interested to see how they engaged with a new life in a new system, or rather, a system “under repair” and one which may ask of them not only to adopt the “seven new roles of educators” as per the first policy change, but with that, also their sense of who they were, their sense of self as practitioners ...

D.Ed. / The transformation of the education system in South Africa is unavoidable due to social transformation in a newly democratised state. The newly established Gauteng Department of Education had to face challenges since 1994 to promote quality education, ownership and stability due to the fragmentation and diversity in communities and schools. In order to restore the culture of service delivering and to promote teaching and learning in schools, it is vital for schools to be provided with resources and conditions that are conducive to quality education. Trained educators and effective management of schools are equally important to ensure that learners receive the best quality education. Total quality school management provides the key to the solution, because the spiral of development, which includes constant monitoring and evaluation throughout the planning, leading and implementation cycles. Total quality school management is an integral part of delivering effective and efficient service. Total quality school management refers to the action, processes and structures necessary to ensure the delivery of highest quality of service to the clients. Total quality school management cultivates the appropriate partnerships and networks in service of the clients. In South Africa the indicators of these frameworks are invariably slanted toward issues of equity, efficiency and redress, but should largely be structured toward the improvement of service and education.

M.Comm. / The South African education and training system has for many years been fragmented and unfair towards underprivileged population groups. Since 1994, many changes have been initiated via legislation to ensure a unified and equal national system of education and training. Higher education has not been excluded from this and is undergoing major changes. These changes are mainly driven by current higher education legislation together with the regulations of the South African Qualifications Authority towards establishing a National Qualifications Framework (NQF). Higher education transformation is built around three central features, namely increased participation, greater responsiveness, and increased cooperation and partnerships. One of the ways in which participation and responsiveness can be achieved is through Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL). Formal RPL has not yet been implemented in higher education institutions, although informal forms of RPL have taken place. In an attempt to understand RPL, the approaches to prior learning recognition in various countries are analysed. Aspects such as the forms of RPL, sources, objectives and uses, benefits and advantages are extrapolated from current sources. A table with a summary per country is provided as a future reference guide. A Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) process model is synthesised after analysis of prior learning recognition process models in different countries such as the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Canada and Australia. This model serves as suggested process model for Recognition of Prior Learning in higher education institutions in South Africa. The model consists of ten stages, namely pre-entry, initial contact, learning identification, preparation for assessment, assessment, verification, accreditation and certification, appeals, recording and post-RPL counselling. Research is based on an analytical and descriptive literature study. The process model requires further empirical testing.