Suchergebnisse

This study sought to establish the quality of educational provision in primary schools in newly resettled farms in Zimbabwe through the Fast Track land reform programme that commenced in 2000. The schools, meant to service children of the newly resettled farmers, were hastily set up without much planning, thereby raising concerns on the quality of educational provision. The research adopted a case study design in which Chiwodza School was selected as a single case for deep probing. Data were collected using ethnographic techniques such as observation, document analysis and interviews with staff at the school. An analysis and interpretation of data established that there was a plethora of problems that affected the teaching and learning process in schools in newly resettled farms in Zimbabwe, thereby affecting negatively the quality of educational provision. Prominent among these problems were poor infrastructure, shortage of instructional materials, inadequate support from the Responsible Authority and School Development Committees, lack of staff development for teachers and school heads, and a general negative attitude of parents towards assisting the schools. The study recommends, inter-alia, urgent government subvention in the provision of classrooms, teachers' accommodation and ablutions, while parents and the responsible authority, on the other hand, should assist with the provision of instructional materials.

This paper examines post independence Zimbabwe's attempts to introduce a form of citizenship education in the nation's education curricula, first in the name of Political Economy introduced at secondary school level shortly after independence in the early 1980s but abandoned soon afterwards, only to resurface as National and Strategic Studies in 2002 at tertiary institutions, specifically, at polytechnics and teachers' colleges. Observations based on the situation on the ground and documentary evidence indicate that attempts towards the provision of some form of citizenship education in Zimbabwe's education system have encountered some problems in the past which have largely been unresolved and continue to hound current efforts. This paper posits that the problems hampering the implementation of an effective citizenship education curriculum stem from the nature, scope, justification, modes of provision and the adoption strategies of citizenship education. The paper argues that for citizenship education to take root in the country's education curricula, it needs to be clearly defined, well justified and properly disseminated into the user system so as to secure 'buy in 'from the various stakeholders and participants in the education system.