The challenges experienced by educators in primary schools regarding continuous professional development

Abstract

The transition from apartheid to democracy in South Africa, which began in 1994 led to a change in a plethora of policies and/or legislation. In recent years there has been much debate on how the standard of education provisioning in schools could be raised in the light of the introduction of the much debated Revised National Curriculum Statement (RNCS) and thereafter the National Curriculum Statement (NCS). These reform initiatives have brought about confusion and a sense of unsettledness amongst educators, including principals as well as their School Management Teams. Furthermore, the abovementioned and other policies required educators to acquaint themselves with either the materials that are used or the content of the curriculum and the planning and presentation of lessons. This entails in some occasions that educators who are more experienced have to assist the less experienced ones since they understand the RNCS and more recently the NCS better than the others. According to me this emphasises the importance of educator development towards raising the standards in schools. Continuous Professional Development (CPD) is a process that fits the role of an educator as a lifelong learner. The aforementioned is captured in the Norms and Standards for Educators (2000). The need for more attention to be accorded to the professional development of practising educators is emphasised in the Report of the Ministerial Committee on Teacher Education (2005). This report led to the development of the National Policy Framework for Teacher Education and Development which has as its aim to attempt to address the need for suitably qualified educators in South Africa. The National Policy Framework for Teacher Education and Development will be used in this study along with the Integrated Quality Management Systems (IQMS) as tools to achieve the continuous development of educators in South African schools. The Personnel Administration Measures (PAM) of 1999 are also used since they stipulate the roles and responsibilities of the educator, including those of the principal, deputy principal(s) as well as the heads of department. In particular it stipulates that the principal (Department of Education, 1999:10) is responsible for the development of staff training programmes, school-based, school-focused and externally directed, and to assist educators, particularly new and inexperienced educators, in developing and achieving educational objectives in accordance with the needs of the school. This research project deals with the challenges experienced by educators regarding their own Continued Professional Development (CPD). It thus aims at coming up with an empirical account of the challenges experienced by the said educators. The study will focus on, among others, the educators’ experiences in the implementation of the IQMS as a developmental tool for educators in schools. It looks at the roles that different staff members in senior positions in terms of the CPD of the educators. These include the developmental opportunities available in the sampled schools. Carefully selected and drafted interview questions assisted me in soliciting answers from the sampled educators.