EDUCATION POLICY AND CURRICULUM DIFFUSION IN SOUTHERN AND EASTERN AFRICA

1. EDUCATION POLICY AND CURRICULUM DIFFUSION IN SOUTHERN AND EASTERN AFRICA Linda Chisholm HSRC 2006

2. Aim and outline • Aim: examine borrowings and lendings in the region associated with outcomes-based education through NQFs. • Theoretical foundations • SA’s economic and political role in S & E Africa • Export of the NQF at moment of withdrawal

3. Theoretical foundations 1 • Growing convergence or divergence of systems • Convergence: Institutionalists – modern education increasingly universal and homogenous across time and space, esp ito credentials and standards and idea of equivalence (Meyer and Ramirez, 2003) • Divergence: Emphasises role of decontextualisation and displacement of policies & their alteration by local contexts; systems may look the same when we look at their discourses, but actual real systems differ (Steiner-Khamsi, 2004)

4. Theoretical foundations 2 • 3 possible types of convergence: consensus, conflict (neo-imperialism; Americanisation) and culturalist (transfer of discourses; indigenisation of actual policies) • Divergence – bottom up change: developing countries can be seen as laboratories for modernity and test sites for contested school reforms then pushed back up or not at all • Network analysis – associations, conferences, weak linkages

5. SA’s political and economic role • Increasing economic penetration – SA is largest foreign direct investor in SADC (R26.8b in 2001) – Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Nigeria, Zambia and Angola biggest trading partners – mining; banking and financial services; telecommunications; aviation services; Shoprite • But is it a regional hegemon? What is a regional hegemon? NEPAD framework of partnership, negotiation and cooperation suggests exchange in field of education

6. Regional lending: NQF • In SA, NEPA established SAQA (1997) and placed outcomes at centre of new ed & training but since then rejected by schooling and higher sector and now confined to industry training • SADC 1997 Protocol on Education and Training promoted NQF which embeds outcomes-based education, a borrowed idea

7. Regional lending: NQF • By 2004, a number of SADC countries had qualifications framework with a strong vocational and training slant: SA, Namibia, Botswana, Mauritius, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique • RQF with technical committees and seeking funding

8. Regional lending: OBE • History of ed change in SADC phases – colonial education, post-independence, structural adjustment, privatisation and liberalisation • Post 1990s: political liberalisation, education review, • Mid 1990s: curriculum reform – learner-centredness • OBE pushed and part of donor sector investment strategies – funding dependent on adoption – South African consultants and publishers

9. Export of NQF and OBE to the region • Export from South Africa, but only partial acceptance • Export at the moment of it being dismantled in SA and international support is diminishing • SA was a ‘laboratory for modernity’ in terms of the NQF and OBE but what does its continuation in SADC mean?

10. How and why has the NQF diffused through the region? • ‘Discourse coalitions’ that include donors, policy entrepreneurs, researchers, state actors, publishers, etc • Conference as networking agent and creator of ‘discourse coalitions’ through which ideas are diffused; ‘issue networks – journals, associations, conferences – export issues for their own survival

11. SAQA regional conference 2003 • Conference on Qualifications and Standards: Harmonisation and Articulation Initiatives • Donor: Danida; lead agent: SAQA; international participants: UK, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, SA NGOs and SAQA team, representatives from SADC

12. SAQA Conference • Aim to share ideas • Context: Curriculum Review (2000) and NQF Review (2002) • Editorial of proceedings: controversy about feasibility; Contributions from Australia and New Zealand signalled major retreat • SA policy entrepreneurs identified source of problem as opposition in higher ed and schooling – advocated retreat to private vocational ed • RQF paper – common system and mobility – technical committees, no funding

13. Assessment conferences • Continuous and exams based assessment systems part of OBE-system • International Ed Assement Association – African Educational Assessment Association – regional conference for last three years – Zambia, Malawi, South Africa • Discourse increasingly that of OBE and influenced by South African terminology

14. SA as test site • Universal ideas have local root • Roots of NQF idea in England, UK, New Zealand, Australia and competency-based modular training • In inception when taken up in SA, and facilitated by ILO, EU, OECD; consultants employed to assist SA develop the idea • Evaluation by one of those consultants to ILO in 2005 damning

15. SA as test site: critique of NQF • NQFs are top-down initiatives / assessment frameworks with no relation to institutional site of provision and practice – in under-resourced contexts, provision is needed as well • Credit accumulation and portability not realised • Career paths not realised • Basic fallacy of NQF is that education can compensate for society (can overcome inequalities that have their root in society) • South African experiment too ambitious and not to be imitated

16. Critique • Problems of system are political, administrative and technical – require enormous capacity that can only be created through funding • Success stories are more modest

17. Conclusion • SA borrowed idea of NQF and OBE, but it was also a test site for these ideas • Regional political economy change facilitated adoption in region • Policy entrepreneurs lent their expertise to SA and SA lent its to the region • Donors facilitated borrowing and lending • Conferences played an important role • Currently retreat from these ideas in SA, but what is happening in the region?

18. If a bracelet fits, wear it; but if it hurts you, throw it away, no matter how shiny. Kenyan proverb When you go in search of honey you must expect to be stung by bees. Kenneth Kaunda end