Case Study 4
Namibia
The education reform in Namibia, which was focused on reforming teachers’ training, illustrates how education can be thought of as a tool for social change and how teachers can, and should be, a central element in this effort.
Teacher Training in Namibia: Teachers at the Centre of Education Reform
After the Namibian independence in 1990, the creation of an education system that would break with the former one became a priority. In contrast to the education that was marked by authoritarian practices that reinforced racial segregation in schools, the new system aimed to promote access, equity, quality and democracy.
With a learner-centred pedagogy, teacher training was set as a cornerstone of the reform, placing teachers as creative agents in schools.
Relevance: Education for Social Change in Post-Colonial Contexts
After becoming independent, many African countries perceived a need to reform their education systems, as the former ones were marked by colonial aspects, seen especially in the curriculum and in teacher training. However, despite recognising the relevance of these reforms, planning and implementing them has proven to be challenging. Part of the challenges involve financing and finding ways to truly bring about change. At the same time, since the 1990s education has been thought of as a means for “development”, usually focusing on economic development.
The “new orthodoxy” that has become internationally adopted, tends to promote a technical view of education and eliminate its social purposes and the critical role teachers play in improving teaching and promoting social change. Namibia is one of the countries to have gone through the process of reforming education after its independence in the recent past, framing education as a way to move on from former authoritarian approaches.
The Approach: Teachers at the Centre of Educational Change
Once independence took place, education reform was centred around four main goals: access, equity, quality and democracy. Teacher education was treated as the centrepiece of a national educational reform programme, seen as fundamental to break the cycle of authoritarianism and inequities. This contrasts with an approach that frames teachers as deliverers of content or as a barrier to change. Second, there was a focus on qualitative change (tackling quality, inequality and the social purposes of education), unlike countries that have focused on quantitative indicators (such as more schools and more teachers). Teachers were trained to implement a student-centred pedagogy and to create democratic schools. Relatedly, the curriculum should be relevant and respectful of cultural traditions and communities.
Between 1990 and the early 2000s, the country made great strides in education: enrollment in primary education increased from 60% to 95%, there was a 30% increase in the teaching workforce , and 3,000 new classrooms were built by 200610 . Access to secondary education increased significantly and Grade 12 student enrollment for the Namibia Senior Secondary Certificate Higher level (NSSCH) increased from 904 students in 1996 to 16,308 in 2017.
Lessons Learned and Limitations
In contrast to the understanding that education is a technical matter which is mostly at the service of economic development, the Namibian education reform is an illustration of how education is connected to deeper and wider social issues. In the context of a recently conquered independence and a transition from the Apartheid, the new country envisaged that education should play a central role in changing society. Teachers are central actors in this educational shift, and training them to enact change is fundamental, which should happen together with other reforms, such as curriculum, evaluation and management. Current globally-promoted market-based practices and approaches go against this premise. Instead, they harm the professionalism of teachers by reducing their work to delivering standardised content, training for tests or leaving them in precarious working conditions, thus hindering the possibility of teachers to improve the quality of education.
However, in spite of the advances and improvements resulting from both education and other social policies (such as policies for the protection of children), there are still considerable challenges in Namibian education concerning learning outcomes and access. Some studies have indicated that the new teacher training has had a positive impact on teachers, but that it has not affected practice as much as expected. 11 Thus, other policies are needed to advance change, to continue improving education quality, and to tackle teacher absences, poor pupil performance and the inadequate physical conditions that exist in many schools and classrooms. Nonetheless, this case points to the relevance of investing in teacher training and empowering them as agents of social and educational change.
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