NOTA BENE
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LIST OF ARTICLES
Introduction (By the Editors)
“Educate Me” (Lenworth Wilson Jr.)
Welcome Speech (By Mrs. Sarah Wescott-Williams, Dutch St. Martin's
Commissioner of Education)
Key to a Brighter Future: A Vision for Higher Education in the New St.
Martin (By Josianne Fleming-Artsen)
Three decades of innovations in
Caribbean education systems: Why some
succeed and others don’t (By Zellynne Jennings-Craig)
Dealing with the Historical Paradoxes
of a Globalized Educationalisation – a way to write the “New” Cultural History
of Education? (By Marc Depaepe)
Keep the heaps together! Diversity, citizenship and education: St.
Martin as a Caribbean immigration metropolis, lessons from Amsterdam and vice
versa (By Iwan Sewandono)
Pedagogy, identity, and politics Educating in an identity (ethnic) crisis
context: A study of the French West Indies case (By Max Bélaise)
The American University of the
Caribbean: Montserrat’s Loss, St.
Marteen’s Gain (By Gracelyn Cassell)
The General Agreement on Trade in
Services and Education in the
Caribbean: Three Case Studies (By Marguerite E. Cummins-Williams)
The Evolution of Science Curricula in
Developing Countries and the Issue of
Relevance (By June George)
Letting the voiceless tell their
stories Using oral sources for Caribbean history writing: yet more biased accounts? (By Milton A. George)
What the Tamarind tree whispers: Notes on a pedagogy of tragedy (By Francio Guadeloupe)
Changing Times — Creating
Inclusive Schools (By Yegin Habtes)
Does Block Scheduling Decrease
Instructional Time? A Look at St.
Croix’s Five Public Secondary Schools
using Four Block Schedule Types (By Jeannette J. Lovern)
The concept of good governance as a practical guide in education for public
administration (By Rob Paulussen)
Social and Emotional Learning: Is it
the missing piece in our schools? (By Marilyn Robb)
Understanding Linguistic Diversity in
Caribbean Classrooms: Ethnographic Methods for Teachers (By Peter Snow)
Decolonizing
the Educational System on St. Martin, or
How to Teach Globalization under the
Flamboyant Tree (By Maria Cijntje-Van Enckevort)
Progressive Education: an alternative
or an illusion? About the implementation of educational innovations in Belgium
and elsewhere (By Marc Depaepe)
Planning and Leading Change: Creating a New Change Model for the
implementation of a Teacher Education Program on St. Maarten (By Josianne Fleming-Artsen)
Getting the Job done! Let the Sisters
speak Historical development of Catholic Education on Sint Maarten (1890-1990):
an oral history account (By Milton A. George)
Doing Theology in a Caribbean
Context: The Caribbean and the
challenges of becoming oneself. (By Milton A. George)
Making sense of the Afro‑Caribbean
concubinage from a canon law perspective (By Milton A. George)
What their modernity can teach us: exploring the linkages between Black Atlantic
identity formations in the Caribbean and consumer capitalism (By Francio Guadeloupe)
How to Define St. Maarten Culture? (By Charlotte Hagenaars)
Educating our teachers in the Caribbean
for the 21st century:
Challenges and prospects (By Zellynne Jennings-Craig)
A Kingdom
identity: mirage, illusion, or vision?
Some allochthonous thoughts on the European and Caribbean Dutch, unequal
equals with an elusive common identity (By Silvio Sergio
Scatolini Apóstolo)
Some
thoughts on Education as Bildung (By Silvio Sergio
Scatolini Apóstolo)
Some
thoughts on the Meaning of Education in the Learning Society (By Silvio Sergio
Scatolini Apóstolo)
Some
thoughts on Jean-Paul Sartre and Education (By Silvio Sergio
Scatolini Apóstolo)
Otto Huiswoud: Political Praxis and Anti-Imperialism* (By Maria Van Enckevort)
Copyright © 2006
University of St. Martin
St. Martin
Studies 2006
1. Conference Proceedings:
Re-Thinking Education in the
Caribbean: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow. A local imperative in a global
context
2. Papers on Education and/or the
Caribbean
Editors:
Maria Cijntje—van Enckevort
Milton A. George
Silvio Sergio Scatolini Apóstolo
Published by
University
of St. Martin
1 University Boulevard
P.O.Box 836
Philipsburg
St. Martin
Netherlands Antilles
Website:
www.usmonline.net
A catalogue record of this book is available
from the University of St. Martin.
For general information on our
products and services or to obtain technical and expert support, please visit
our homepage: www.usmonline.net.
To contact the
editors, e-mail them to:
educonsult@caribserve.net (Maria Cijntje—van Enckevort)
consultants2006@gmail.com (Milton A. George & Silvio Sergio Scatolini
Apóstolo)
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Introduction
The colonial powers
engineered a Caribbean fragmented in terms of languages, as well as legal,
political, and educational systems. Even though the emancipatory movement of
the last century began a process of regional exchange of ideas and ideals,
active interaction and profound regional integration still remain a vocation to
which the Caribbean is called. The USM Educational Conference of 2006 was
conceived of as a propitious opportunity to promote the regional exchange of
ideas and experiences, as well as to broaden visions and facilitate the
creation of ever new networks across the Caribbean and beyond.
From the start, each of the
groups that make up our societies has been confronted with the challenge to
reinvent itself within the concrete geographical and historical coordinates
within which it found itself—sometimes by choice, but often by force. Such a
process of self-reinvention was innovatively undertaken: our forerunners
managed to weave influences coming from different corners of the world into a
tapestry of colours, sounds, smells, dances, tastes, languages, stories, songs,
and more.
Today, our different
Caribbean societies are being confronted with the challenges of an increasingly
globalized world. Not only do many of our compatriots travel to foreign shores
to study, work for a while, or settle down there for good, there are also
thousands of newcomers who arrive on our territories with their own needs and
dreams, hoping to “make it” among us. St. Martin has become a true immigration
metropolis. Of all the Dutch island territories, Dutch St. Martin is the one
where the foreign-born population is almost twice the size of the locally born.
In such a context, even words such as “diaspora” need redefining. As always, it
depends on the perspective of the one telling his or her story. Oddly enough,
the stories of disillusionment and discrimination told by many of our
compatriots who emigrated to apparently greener pastures resemble the stories
related by the immigrants who are seeking to find a home among us. We become the
other, for better and for worse.
The mobility characteristic
of our transnational world entails that educators are often no longer educating
their pupils and students just for their country of residence, but for the
world.
Educating the future
generations has always been a tall order. How to prepare our young for a world
which, in a certain sense, does not yet exist; moreover, for a world that in
many ways is not and will not be ours? Educating is about keeping the present
in sight, which is the legacy of our past, while trying to predict and steer
the course that our societies and the world will be taking.
No matter how daunting it
may appear to us, the challenge to educate our young so that they can become
fully-fledged members of our society is an imperative that our societies cannot
neglect. We must all embrace the call to action and realize that our
educational choices and deeds must be grounded on a thought-out and concerted
reflection that surpasses the borders of our classrooms, schools, and even
territories.
With this year’s
Educational Conference, the University of St. Martin wished to contribute to
the discourse on the nature, mission, shape, goals, and tools of the
educational endeavour in our Caribbean region and beyond. Education is an
open-ended reality, so too is the question how to do it in ways that are fair,
efficient, qualitatively of high standards, and visionary.
The editors
consultants2006@gmail.com
“Educate Me”
Educate me, emancipate me,
now hate me cause I’m not what you thought you created me to be...
Education has been the
social tool, seeking to give meaning to our existence. “Boy go get your
education so u can be somebody”.
Such a subtle tool used by
the slave-masters and colonizers as they figured that this way… they wouldn’t
get no resistance.
So they rape our thoughts
and inject their indoctrination of superior relations, triggering an outbreak
of segregation throughout my block, my town and even this wanna-be global
nation.
And yet… We embrace
education
Some of us use our
education just to feed and caress our grand egos
Then sit around an office
desk 18 hours a-day fantasizing about the Ritz Carlton and the Grand Lidos
Never getting a chance to
know nor even peradventure to fulfill our telos
Trying to find the meaning
of life while straying further and further away from our true purpose
And yet… We embrace
education
“Education is the key to a
thriving economy”, that’s what the politicians say
And of course they’re
right… cause the more education you get is the more taxes you pay.
Calculus, Ecology,
Statistics, Psychology, Accounting, Philosophy, History, Biology, Chemistry,
Computer Technology
All this knowledge gained
just to make sure that the society would acknowledge me
Acknowledging a piece of
paper, rather than what truly makes us who we be.
And yet… We embrace
education.
You show me a man liberated
by education and I’ll show you a man enslaved by indoctrination.
Prisoners of philosophical
ideals conjured up by matters of religious damnation.
Brainwashing us to think
that we are being elevated by this brainwashing,
Then they leave us stuck in
unemployment lines and make us redundant by employing machines.
Say they’re cutting cost of
labor while the cost of education is constantly on the increase
And yet… We embrace
education.
Certificates, Associates,
Bachelors, Masters and Doctorates degree
Propelled by self-imposed
ambitions of what they want us to be
So we all wanna go to
college and get into the Ivy League university
Not to be enlightened but
to see what they want us to see.
Now I’m a rebel without a
rebellion ‘cause I’m still paying the fee.
But this poem proves that
in my mind I am free… so now I can say
You educate me, emancipate
me, now hate me cause I’m not what you thought you created me to be...
University of
St. Martin, N.A. (Education
student)
lj_liljr@yahoo.com
Welcome Speech
Dutch St. Martin’s Commissioner
of Education
Dignitaries,
USM President, Mrs.
Josianne Fleming-Artsen
Organizers,
Speakers,
Presenters,
Ladies and Gentleman,
Good evening!
On behalf of the government
of St. Maarten I welcome those of you here, visiting our shores, especially if
it is your first visit.
To all present and those
yet to join you for this conference, I convey my wish for three most exciting
days of deliberations, as you “re-think Caribbean Education.”
Your aim to re-think
education cannot be momentary.
It cannot be a rethinking
only of where we are today. We are where we are today, also educationally
speaking, because of decisions we made, or did not make in the past.
Not only decisions about
education and systems of education, but about our development in general.
Politically, economically, socially as well.
So in my opinion, you
rightfully place your aim to “re-think education” in a historic (yesterday), a
present (today) and a future (tomorrow) context.
St. Maarten is privileged
to host a gathering of so many distinguished scholars of Caribbean experiences
in education and the educational processes of our countries. While we have not
always walked the same road or done so at the same pace, many common historical
issues shape our educational systems.
Our starting position, for
some decades and for others centuries ago, is similar, coming out of a colonial
system.
How we dealt with that
legacy, what we maintained from that legacy is evident in varying degrees today
in our individual educational systems.
So you have a plethora of
issues that you dissect and reform, and which will still be familiar to all of
us.
My own assessment is that
the USM has selected a distinguished assemblage of scholars and educators from
the region and beyond to do the critical examination of educational issues and
matters in the Caribbean in the broadest sense of the word.
And as I stated earlier,
St. Maarten is proud to host such a distinguished panel, and I add, somewhat
vainly, “rightly so.”
In the words of Dr.
Scatolini a few days ago: “This is a chance for the Dutch Caribbean to get on
the map.” Permit me to paraphrase: This is our chance to position
ourselves on the map. Not only geographically, but also educationally.
To position ourselves, we
need to create the environment like USM has done now and on several occasions
in the past. Bringing this calibre of scholars together.
The physical size of the University
of St. Martin, while ever expanding, should never be a deterrent not to
think big. In fact in today’s modern world, especially when it comes to
education, the question of whether “size matters” or not, is a mute one.
As small nations,
constantly seeking to stay on the cutting edge of global educational innovations,
with the constraints we face, we often run the risk of overlooking our own
inherent strengths.
What these are and whether
they are strengths rather than occasional bursts of energy will be become
evident during many of your discourses.
And finally, several of you
will from varying angles be looking at the Caribbean individual, at us.
And hopefully this
inspection or introspection will be the impetus to move beyond the often heard
lamentations of why we are not all that we can be, but rather focus on whom we
have come, despite it all.
Would that, Dr. Bélaise,
from your reference, by any chance be the “new man or woman”?
Ladies and Gentlemen, again
welcome, much success and even more inspiration.
Key
to a Brighter Future:
A Vision
for Higher Education in the New St. Martin
University of
St. Martin, the
Netherlands Antilles
usmdirector@sintmaarten.net
Currently, the Netherlands
Antilles are undergoing a constitutional change, which would separate all five
islands, Curacao, Bonaire, St. Maarten, Saba, and St. Eustatius and allow each
one to have its own relation with the Netherlands.
St. Maarten is looking
forward to achieving this new status and thus is preparing for this new
identity in which the University of St. Martin has its role to play.
The Conference on
Rethinking Education in the Caribbean has inspired me to make a contribution to
the preface of the Country St. Martin status. The theme I will address focuses
on The Key to a Brighter Future: A Vision for Higher Education in the New St
Martin. Some of the challenges facing tertiary and higher education on St.
Martin are pertinent to the constitutional change debate and some guidelines
for a vision for tertiary and higher education for the Country St. Martin are
recommended.
An excelling tertiary and
higher education sector will be key to a progressive, unified, and novel
society in the country St. Martin. Education and training after the high school
levels will be more important in realizing career directions and lifelong
opportunities to achieve a balanced, unified and culturally and socially
vibrant society, in which each and everyone can participate. With more emphasis
on self reliance, the demand for more knowledgeable and research oriented human
resources will also increase. For every St. Martin citizen, the ability of
being able to unlearn and relearn, research and document, change direction or
career paths will be paramount to survival and success. An onus will be put on
tertiary and higher education to fulfil these demands.
In St. Martin, serious work
needs to be done in the tertiary and higher education sectors and there are
considerable challenges. Although the island boasts a post secondary vocational
institute, The St. Maarten Institute for Technology and Hospitality (SMITH), a
hybrid commuter college, The University of St. Martin (USM), and a post
graduate medical institution, The American University of the Caribbean (AUC),
there is a fundamental need for a sound tertiary and higher education policy.
Recognition should be given to the fact that the majority of students at the
AUC are not St. Martin natives or Antilleans, while at USM the ratio is 60%
Antilleans to 40 % non Antilleans (University of St. Martin Annual Report,
2005). The Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development states, in its
report entitled Educational Policy Reform in the Netherlands Antilles, that
“Tertiary education is a neglected area of educational provision of the
Netherlands Antilles” (2001:26). On St. Maarten this is no exception and to add
to this as Rowley points out, “Higher education institutions are recognized as
being in the knowledge business and increasingly exposed to pressures in the
market” (2000:1).
Currently, the significant
increase in the number of St. Martin students seeking tertiary and higher
education has put pressure on education officials and subsequently, because of
the lack of proper planning, government is forced to take ad hoc decisions.
These include decisions such as students being allotted scholarships to study
anywhere and for whatever they want, types of assistance offered to tertiary
institutions, and the omission of tertiary institutions and higher education
institutions from round-table or constitutional talks or research projects. For
tertiary or higher education institutions to receive the allotted federal
government grants or subsidies requires surgical precision. Overall, based on
how tertiary institutions are treated, government’s perception of these
institutions may be as sine qua non. This is a blatant disrespect for
local tertiary and higher education institutions and impacts the prosperity of
the island nation as a whole.
According to Badejo (1989)
in his book, Claude a Portrait of Power, “Prosperity…not always means
the mere availability of money. But even by that yardstick, it is doubtful if
St. Maarten can really be classified as a prosperous island” (p.170). Claude as
cited in Badejo (1989) posited, “Only a limited number of people have gained
financially and it is doubtful if those benefits can compensate the loss of
Philipsburg to foreigners. Prosperity should therefore be redefined” (p.170).
This statement still seems true today. In this light the redefinition of
prosperity must include tertiary and higher education for all St. Martiners.
Country St. Martin will require more academic, intellectual and research
prosperity in order to recapture our losses which include the capital.
Functionalism perceives the
society as a living organism with many interrelated parts (Pai & Adler,
2001). These living interrelated organisms show some commonalities and
according to Durkheim (1985), “Members of the society need to have a set of
common beliefs, knowledge, and values for social unity and cohesion”… “for
every society requires that its members have different roles” (21). This
organic unity of society leads functionalists to speculate about needs, which
must be met for a social system to exist, as well as the ways in which social
institutions satisfy those needs. Social systems work together to maintain
equilibrium. It is achieved through the socialization of members of the society
into the basic values and norms of the society so that consensus is reached.
Tertiary and higher education are considered microcosms of the larger society. The
school perpetuates the established social, cultural, economic and political
structures and norms (Pai & Adler, 2001). Universities have traditionally
been seen as cloistered communities for reflection, and have now grown into
open communities, thus giving more access. Policies ensuring access to tertiary
and higher education to the Country St Martin’s tertiary institutions, colleges
and universities must not be overlooked. Simpson and Wendling (2005), noted
that the “sole purpose of colleges and universities is the advancement of
knowledge and research” (p.385). In Country St. Martin, this should be no
exception and tertiary and higher education should facilitate research and
documentation, while enabling the expression of sound arguments based on research
without fear.
Based on the social make-up
of the island, tertiary and higher education in Country St. Martin will no
doubt have an impact on the surrounding islands and region.
According to the United
Nations in its State Party Report (1999) at the International Convention on the
Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination in the Netherlands agued that
St. Maarten has a regular immigration from the “Dominican Republic, Jamaica,
and Haiti” (Article 5(e)(iv), 206). This means a regular inflow of students
that becomes almost uncontrollable. This includes children from both the
(documented and undocumented) foreign residents. These immigrants also proceed
from the French (northern) side, because of our open border policy. Although
this information is primarily focusing on the primary and secondary school
systems, noteworthy is that tertiary and higher education sector is also
impacted. Many migrants from countries such as the Dominican Republic, Jamaica,
Guyana and Dominica irrespective of their documented or undocumented status
tend to seek tertiary or higher education. Thus, it is safe to state that on
St. Martin the phenomenon of internationalization of education has been taking
place in an unstructured and unplanned manner. However, in the Country St. Martin
internationalization should become part of the economic existence and tertiary
and higher education policy.
Considering the
trans-nationalization of education, “the internationalization of tertiary and
higher education, the international exchange of students, scholars, bilateral
and multilateral agreements around knowledge, research, transfer of expertise
and skills and flows of learners and scholars are all vitally important and
must be pursued energetically and extended” (Asmal, 2006:4). With an increased
demand for competent and qualified human resources in country St. Martin this
internationalization of tertiary and higher education will become more
pronounced and the proper policies and laws will have to be drafted and adhered
to.
There is a constant
discrepancy between educational supply and the demand of the possible
educational resources. This issue is evidenced in the Bureau of Educational
Research, Policy, Planning and Innovation report (2006, February), where data
are provided on how many educators are delivered per annum. The USM has
delivered from “2002-2005, 16 teachers” (p.7), and further information from the
“study-financing section at the Insular Department of Education shows that the
majority of teachers who study teaching in the Netherlands do not return to the
island for employment” (p.8). In addition, on the tertiary and higher education
level this is also the case in other sectors since most of the demands cannot
be fulfilled in terms of the types of programs being requested by the students
on the island. Furthermore, there are no economies of scale to support the
offering of a wide variety of courses and programs. Thus, innovation is a
necessity in this sector and in Country St. Martin the need for innovation and
use of technology especially distance learning and e-learning will be greater.
The University of St. Martin has had this experience with Mount Saint Vincent
University and the University of the Virgin Islands and continues to
innovate...
Since the financing of
tertiary and higher education continues to be an issue, the need for greater
returns on investment in this sector will be paramount. In the future,
the role that governments will have to play in regards to tertiary and higher
education will be more pronounced as the appropriation of tax payers’ resources
for this sector will increase. In Country St. Martin the methodologies and laws
governing the allotments of scholarships and grants to pursue tertiary and
higher education will have to be revamped and redesigned. Although the review
of the policies is currently taking place by government, the revamping and
redesigning of these policies are a must. Students should be given access to
scholarships through loans and contractual agreements. Laws defining
tertiary and higher education will have to be drafted specifically for Country
St. Martin recognizing a wide variety of disciplines and degrees. However, it
is at the policy level where differences will ultimately be made. The policy
governing grants and scholarships for tertiary and higher education will have
to be in concert with the changing and diverse needs of the country and its
students; we must take advantage of new technologies, provide higher returns on
investment of tax-payers’ funds and ensure the returns are internationally
competitive in quality. Thus, once these policies are implemented
correctly, Country St. Martin will be in possession of internationally
recognized (accredited) and qualified human resources and human capital.
Vision is the fundamental
force that drives everything else in our lives and for Country St. Martin this
is relevant. It encompasses us “with a sense of unique contribution that is
ours to make. It empowers us to put first things first, compasses ahead of
clocks, people ahead of scheduled things”(Covey, Merrill, and Merrill, 1994,
p.116). A vision can also be described as knowing the results and outcomes and
being aware of the implementation process through conceptual and creative
thinking (Bennis and Nanus, 1985). Envisioning tertiary and higher education in
Country St. Martin and developing vision into reality is a challenge and a work
in progress.
To summarize, due to the
pivotal role that tertiary and higher education will play in the new status for
the island nation, a clear vision and understanding of this sector is
necessary. This understanding should include a proper definition of tertiary
and higher education, the role that tertiary and higher education plays on St.
Maarten and in the region especially in relation to migration and
trans-nationalization, new trends in this sector, sustainability and emphasis
on the research element. In addition, proper laws and policies governing
tertiary and higher education sector are a must since these will provide more
opportunities for participation for all our citizens, create improvement
incentives for quality, research and information dissemination while
encouraging citizens to realize its value. The tertiary and higher
education sectors should not be held solely accountable for bringing about the
necessary changes. The community itself in Country St. Martin will be
instrumental in actualizing the relevant prosperity.
References and/or complementary bibliography
Asmal, K. (2006). Higher
education in a changing world: opportunities for transformation and renewal.
Conference conducted at the meeting of the Association of Commonwealth
Universities, Queen’s Universities, Belfast.
Badejo, F. (1989). Claude,
a portrait of power. St. Maarten, Netherlands Antilles: International
Publishing House.
Bennis, W. & Nanus, B.
(1985). Leaders: The strategies for taking charge. New York: Harper and
Row.
Covey, S. R., Merrill, A.
R., & Merrill, R. R. (1994). First things first. New York: Simon
& Schuster.
Bureau of Educational Research,
Policy, Planning and Innovation. (2006,
February). Planning
teacher supply against demand. St. Maarten, Netherlands Antilles:
Government Printing Office.
Durkheim, E. (1985).
Definition of education. In J. H. Ballentine (Ed.), Schools and society: A
reader in education and sociology (pp. 19-22). Palo Alto, CA: Mayfield.
Pai, Y. & Adler, S. A.
(2001). Cultural foundations of education. (3rd ed.). New
Jersey: Upper Saddle River.
Rowley, J. (2000). Is
higher education ready for knowledge management? The International Journal
of Educational Management, 14(7), 1-9.
Simpson, E., &
Wendling, K. (2005, Nov.). Equality and Merit: A Merit-based argument for
equity policies in higher education. Educational Theory, 55(4), 385-389.
University of St. Martin. (2005).
Annual report, St. Maarten, Netherlands Antilles Ministry of Education.
(2005). Tertiary education policy directions for the 21st century
(White Paper). New Zealand: Government Printing Office.
Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development. (2001, September). Education policy reform in
the Netherlands Antilles. Curacao, Netherlands Antilles: Government
Printing Office.
United Nations High
Commission for Human Rights. (1999, July). The elimination of all forms of
racial discrimination (CERD/C/362/Add.4). Washington, DC: Author.
Three decades of
innovations in Caribbean education systems:
Why some succeed and others don’t
University of
the West Indies, Jamaica
eddevser@cwjamaica.com
Introduction
Why do some innovations
succeed and others don’t? The term “innovation” itself may give us a
clue. An innovation is an idea perceived as new; it
need not be objectively new, but to those using it for the first time it is
new. In other words, what is considered as a new idea in one setting is viewed
as old and worn in another. It is a matter of perception. In a sense,
innovation, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.
This reminds me of the
early 1990s when I visited the interior of Guyana, the only English-speaking
country on the South American continent. I was doing workshops with teachers
and principals with a team from the National Centre for Educational Resource
Development (NCERD). The workshops were held in a place called Kato, surrounded
by the Pakaraima mountains, and inhabited largely by Amerindians —the
indigenous population. Here, transport was mainly by foot. One day as we
were walking up a steep hill, I noted that the stones at my feet were rather
unusual. Some were hard, jagged edged and a deep red in colour; others very
dark brown, a deep grey, a white-almost transparent. I was so fascinated by
them that I picked up some small pieces and put them in my bag. By the end of
the journey I had quite a collection. Not only the Amerindians (who apparently
could not stop laughing at me) but also my colleagues thought I was rather
crazy and wanted to know what I was going to do with “those pieces of rock.”
“They’ll make good paper weights,” I said.
On my return to the
capital city, Georgetown, I discovered some time later from a
geologist that these were not ordinary stones, but semi-precious
ones and was advised to take them to the Ministry of Gold and Diamond
Mining which had a lapidary where I could get them cut and
polished. I had most of them cut into different shapes and sizes and
subsequently made into jewellery of red and brown jasper, rose quartz and
granite. What my colleagues had dismissed as useless pieces of rock, I had seen
as value. Indeed, I had seen beauty in them. Innovations are like this, too. It
is often difficult to trace their origins. We see them as jasper, but don’t
know that they began their life as a little piece of jagged red stone which
would have gone unnoticed if someone with a perceptive eye who detected some
value in them had not come by them. And having seen value in it, the innovation
is then taken through a process and, like the stones being cut and polished, it
is invariably adapted and changed sometimes beyond recognition.
Just as the success with the cut and polish of the stone, depends on the
knowledge and skill of the lapidary, so the success of the innovation will
depend on the knowledge and skill of its implementers, as well as on those who
manage the implementation process. But each one of us looking at the finished
stone will judge the success of the cut and polish differently. Some would
prefer a rougher cut; others a smoother finish. We use different standards,
depending on the standpoint from which we are looking at it. The success of
innovations is judged in a similar way.
Stephen Heyneman in
1984 in a discussion of what has been learnt about the impact of
innovations in Third World education systems, asked ”Where is the Entebbe
Mathematics now?” He concluded at the time, that “the result has been new
curricula and new techniques for teaching, but classrooms left unchanged” (ibid.,
p. 296). In 1992, Larry Cuban asked a similar question about the
platoon system, “a Progressive innovation begun in Gary Indiana, schools in
1906 that had elementary school pupils change classes for specialized
instruction in academic, practical arts, and physical education rather than
have them stay the entire day in self-contained classes” (p 169). Cuban
then proceeded to show how the kindergarten , an
innovation which began as an attempt to alter the relationship between schools
and communities was introduced in the United States in 1906
and was still surviving a century later but had been
adapted and altered over time to becoming schools for preparing
five year –olds for first grade.
Standards for judging success
There are many innovations
that have been introduced into Caribbean education systems about which we could
ask the same question as of the Entebbe Mathematics, or the platoon system–
where are they now? Implied in this question is the sense that if we do
not know where they are, then they have not survived and therefore have failed.
Survival over time is an indicator of an innovation’s success. But how much
time? Cuban (1998) identifies ‘longevity’ as the single most
common used indicator of reform success and adds that this is ‘not a mere year
or two, or a decade, but a quarter or half century of survival” (p167). But
what criterion is used to assess the success of an innovation depends on who is
making the judgement. As Cuban (ibid) contends, there are certain innovations
that capture the imagination of the people, spread rapidly, and have strong
popular appeal (e.g. use of desktop computers). Popularity then
becomes another important standard. Policy makers, the media,
administrators and researchers use the effectiveness standard
which is essentially concerned with the extent to which intended goals have
been achieved. The latter is usually determined by students’ test
scores and performance at external examinations. Policy makers and
administrators also use the fidelity standard to
assess the success of an innovation. Success, in their view, is
determined by the extent to which the innovation is implemented just as the
initiators had intended. In other words, that it has remained faithful to the
blueprint. But those who have to implement innovations –teachers and
principals –are invariably told not to use an innovation (e.g. a new curriculum
guide) as a blueprint, but to feel free to adapt it to suit their particular
situation. Thus the more adaptable the innovation, the more the implementers
find it compatible with their needs and the better for them. To implementers of
innovations, therefore, adaptability is the most important measure of an innovation’s
success.
Aims of the Paper
The main aim of this paper
is to examine why certain innovations introduced into Caribbean education
systems have been successful, while others have not. In so doing I will firstly
give a background to the education systems in the Anglophone Caribbean with a
view to showing why these innovations became necessary. The main goals of the
innovations will be highlighted and then I will discuss the extent to which the
innovations conform to the standards of longevity, popularity, effectiveness,
fidelity and adaptability as measures of success. As the fate of an
innovation is in large measure determined by the effectiveness of its
implementation, I will also explore the extent to which planners took into
consideration the main factors that research has identified as affecting
implementation (i.e. the process of putting into practice an idea, programme or
set of activities new to the people attempting or expected to change) (Fullan,
1982:54). Finally, I will discuss some implications of the
analysis.
The innovations selected
for this paper are (i) a mathematics project for the primary level in Guyana
(GMP); (ii) the Project for the Improved Management of Educational Resources
(PRIMER) which was tried out in five rural All-Age schools (i.e. schools with
intake of pupils from 6 to 15 years of age) in Jamaica. This
project was funded by Canada’s International
Development Research Centre (IDRC): (iii) the Primary
Education Project(PEP) funded by the University of the West Indies (UWI)
and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID); (iv)
the Grade 10/11 programme in Jamaica; (v) the Resource
and Technology (R&T) curriculum in the Reform of Secondary
Education (ROSE) programme in Jamaica; and (vi) The Caribbean
Examinations Council Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC). They are all
innovative because at the time of their initiation they involved the use of
ideas, or practices, which were perceived as new by their users and which were
designed to bring about desirable changes.
‘Innovation’ is often used interchangeably with ‘change’. Miles (1964)
defines innovation as a deliberate novel, specific change which is thought to
be more efficacious in accomplishing the goals of a system. ‘Reform’ and
‘change’ are also sometimes used interchangeably. For example, Cuban (1992)
refers to fundamental reforms which seek to transform “to alter permanently … a
complete overhaul, not renovations…fundamental changes” (p170). The changes
explored in this paper are those that seek to bring about fundamental changes
including new goals, structures and roles in schools, changes in organization
of curricula, examination systems, etc. The main goals of the projects with
which we are concerned give evidence of such desired changes. These are
set out in Table 1 together with evidence for their success or failure drawn
mostly from published research, evaluation studies and higher degree
dissertation.
Background to the education systems of the
Anglophone Caribbean: Main Goals of the Innovations
The innovations addressed
in this paper have been carried out in some 16 Caribbean countries listed in
Table 1. Most of these have been designated small states (Bray &
Packer 1993), characterized by isolation and economic dependency on the
developed world. Many also suffer from a scarcity of human resources which
necessitates education officials having to perform multiple roles, stretching
some of them beyond their capability. Sometimes specialists with needed
technical skills are not available locally thereby making it necessary to
utilize expatriate expertise which invariably is tied in with
international funding for projects.
The countries in Table 1
all have in common ties with Britain as ex-colonies which have left the mark of
the British on their education systems. For example, they all have primary
schools which offer 6 years of education which culminates in the Common
Entrance or 11+ Examination. This determines who enters the prestigious general
secondary or high schools which are not unlike the British grammar-type
schools, pursuing a predominantly academic curriculum designed for entry into
colleges and universities or into the more prestigious jobs in the society.
Children not selected for these schools go to schools which offer
technical-vocational programmes geared to the world of work, or remain in the
All-Age schools. These institutions are widely regarded as second-rate ‘schools
for failures’.
Of the problems in
education that all these countries have in common, three have particular
relevance for this paper. The first has to do with the fact that the
wealth of most of these countries lies in the land, particularly in
agriculture, and yet in most of these countries, negative attitudes towards
agriculture and rural living persist. Youngsters who have been trained in
agriculture opt for other types of jobs on leaving school (Jennings-Wray, 1982). Few wish to remain in rural
areas and drift towards the towns and cities invariably to join the long queues
of the unemployed. The education system has been partially blamed for this
problem on the grounds that its ‘irrelevant ‘Western style curriculum nurtures
in the youth both negative attitudes towards agricultural work and
unrealistic job expectations. To counteract such irrelevance, many
Caribbean countries in the 1970s diversified the curricula in their secondary
schools by introducing vocational subjects and work experience programmes and
by giving more emphasis to agriculture in schools. The Grade 10/11 Programme in
Jamaica is one such example. This programme generally was designed to achieve
goals of access and equality of opportunity – all central features of the
democratic socialist ideology of the Jamaican government of the day (Manley,
1974). Other major objectives of the latter programme were: introducing
self-instructional materials in Jamaican education, encouraging independence in
learning, and the development of self-reliance on the part of the
learners. Worth noting is the fact that the issue of relevance to the
needs of the Caribbean region particularly with regard to the
external examination system was high on the agenda for action of
governments in the Caribbean in the early 1970s. The Caribbean
Examinations Council (CXC) was established in 1972, to offer its own Secondary
Education Certificate (CSEC) to replace the London and Cambridge General
Certificate of Education (GCE) Ordinary level.
While the Grade 10-11
programme was taking hold in the Jamaican secondary system, an influential
report was published by UNESCO in 1983. It was titled Jamaica:
Development of Secondary Education. The report outlined major
problems in the education system, which included the variety of
types of secondary schools, the differences in the quality of their curricular offering
and their terminal examinations, and the general unpreparedness of the
graduates for the world of work. The All Age Schools, whose curricula
were more aligned to the primary than to the secondary schools, were the most
disadvantaged in every respect (quality of school plant and facilities, teacher
qualification, resources, etc.), even though they represented the largest group
of schools offering secondary education in grades 7-9. In 1993, Jamaica
had 486 All Age Schools, 12 Comprehensive High, 58 New Secondary, and 56
Traditional High Schools. Based on the findings of the UNESCO report and with
funds from the World Bank, the Government of Jamaica launched a major reform
effort to rationalise the secondary education situation. The Reform of Secondary
Education (ROSE) centred around the introduction of a common curriculum
designed to improve access to, equity in, and the quality of educational
offering at the lower secondary level (grades 7-9), as well as to improve the
productivity of the graduates. The new curriculum for ROSE is centred around
five core subjects: mathematics, language arts, social studies, integrated
science, and “resource and technology” (R&T), with career education infused
into all these areas. In this paper, most emphasis will be on the
R&T.
The GMP was also linked
with the achievement of goals for transforming the Guyanese society. Two of the
values considered relevant to the Guyanese society which were used as a basis
for the re-organisation of education in Guyana during the 1970s were:
'collective work and responsibility' and 'cooperative economics'. The
former referred to the thrust of the Guyanese to build and maintain their
communities and their nation 'through collective efforts and to solve common
problems cooperatively' (Baird, 1972:8). In the same paper Baird makes the
important point that the achievement of any national goal "is largely
dependent upon the extent to which outcomes of a particular education
programme supports these goals (my emphasis)' (ibid:3). The ‘working
togetherness’ and the solving of common problems cooperatively were seen as
outcomes of a methodology that continually emphasised the need for pupils to
work together in groups. The belief was that if an independent Guyana was to be
able to solve its own problems, its people needed to become self-reliant and
well endowed with new ways of thinking that would enable them to solve common
problems cooperatively. It is not insignificant that the chief consultant to
the GMP should make this observation about group work: “Pupils would become
more self-reliant, would have opportunities for use of initiative and to show
originality and would work in cooperation –a basic tenet of the Cooperative
republic of Guyana. Thus, the basis for these group methods is both psychological
and ideological” (Broomes, 1975:8).
The theme of 'working
together to solve common problems cooperatively', if not explicit in the PEP,
was certainly implicit. But to appreciate this, one has to see the PEP in the
context of attempts to promote cooperation amongst members of the Caribbean
Community (CARICOM) and ultimately to achieve regional integration. At the
inaugural meeting of the Standing Committee of Ministers Responsible for
Education (SCME) in 1975, the Ministers called for collaborative action at the
regional and sub-regional levels in the promotion of educational development
within CARICOM. The PEP, initiated in 1979, has to be seen as a response to the
call for such collaboration.
The second problem relates
to the fact that most of the countries have fallen short in meeting two
major objectives of primary education: namely, to produce a literate and
numerate population and to provide a sound foundation on which
further education can build. The World Bank country study on the Caribbean
region concluded that the quality of primary education was low throughout the
region,’ particularly in the areas of reading, writing and numeracy’ (World
Bank, 1993:68). At the secondary level, the World Bank report noted the
inadequate amount of time devoted in the timetable to mathematics and English
and the low pass rates in these subjects in the CSEC. But the problem has
its root at the primary level where over the years performance in mathematics
has consistently been weak. Guyana was one of the first countries to make a
concerted effort to improve the teaching of mathematics at the primary level
while at the same time addressing the issue of ‘relevance ‘to the country’s
needs. The cooperative approach to learning, which was a strong feature
of the Mathematics, was considered consistent with the Cooperative Socialism
ideology of Guyana. Worthy of note is the fact that both Project PRIMER and the
UWI/USAID Primary Education Project sought to address the problem of literacy
and numeracy.
The third problem relates
to the content of the lower secondary curriculum. While the CSEC exerts a
strong influence on what is taught at the upper levels of the secondary system,
traditionally schools have been given more leeway in determining the content of
the lower secondary curriculum (grades 7-9). More and more countries, however,
have been introducing a common curriculum at this level. But with the rapid
advance of technology and with the expansion of knowledge which has
accompanied this technological advancement, Caribbean countries have been
anxious not to be left far behind the developed countries. What
should be the content of the lower secondary curriculum has become quite an
issue. How should technical-vocational subjects be treated? How can technology
be incorporated into the curriculum and how can the Arts which have
traditionally been neglected in the secondary curriculum (Tucker, 2002) be made
an integral part of the education of all children? In addition to these
concerns there is also the question of how this content should be
organized. Given that the grades 7-9 curricula should provide a
sound base for the subjects that the students
would choose to take for CSEC, the question has
arisen whether it should be subject-based like the
curriculum in the prestigious high schools or
whether it should be integrated. Brain research which
has underscored how authentic learning is
facilitated when content is presented in a more
holistic way (Caine and Caine) has given integrated
curricula an added significance This paper presents an
example of how one country-Jamaica- has dealt with these
issues through its ROSE and in particular the R&T curriculum.
The evidence in Table 1
suggests that of the innovations at the primary level, the most successful has
been the Mathematics project in Guyana, while Project PRIMER in Jamaica has
been an outright failure. At the secondary level, by far the most successful
innovation has been the CSEC, with both the Grade 10/11 Programme and the
Resource and Technology curriculum being somewhat successful.
How do we account for such
differential outcomes? And by what standards are they being judged?
Factors that affect implementation
Fullan & Stiegelbauer
(1991) categorize factors affecting implementation of an innovation in terms of
characteristics pertaining to: (i) the characteristics of the innovation
itself; (ii) local/school characteristics; and (iii) external factors.
They identify 15 factors which they maintain form a system of
variables that interact over time to determine success or failure; the more
factors support implementation, the more change in practice is likely to
be accomplished while the process becomes less effective if more factors
work against implementation. Research in the Caribbean has identified
additional factors that affect implementation, influenced by the fact that
education systems in the Anglophone Caribbean are, for the most part,
centralised, with ministries of education exercising control over the primary
curriculum in the public schools. As pointed out earlier, the upper
secondary curriculum is largely determined by the syllabuses for the CSEC.
Table 2 identifies 21 factors including those from Fullan. In the discussion
that follows where a particular factor applies at more than one level (e.g.
local and national), both levels will be discussed simultaneously.
Characteristics of the innovation
As can be seen from Table 2
there was clearly a need for the innovations which were also
considered relevant to societal needs. For example, in the
case of the GMP, the methodology of teaching mathematics, in fact, was linked
to the achievement of wider developmental goals of Guyana. The
project was described as being geared to "develop certain personality
traits such as self-reliance" and "to encourage a cooperative
approach to learning in schools” (Ministry of Education, Social Development and
Culture 1977:10). The PEP was introduced in response to the need to
improve the curriculum of primary schools in the Caribbean, and both the G10/11
and CSEC were seen as responding to societal needs. Teachers, principals and
students felt that R&T was essential for developing the skills needed for
living in a technological society, for developing problem-solving skills and
for promoting an holistic and student-centred approach to education (Jennings
1998). Differences in perceptions of need are evident in the case of PRIMER.
From the perspective of educational planners PRIMER was relevant to the needs
of Jamaican primary education as set out in the Five Year Education Plan
(1978-83).For example it was observed in the plan that ‘approximately 53% of
the children aged 11 years are not achieving at acceptable standards in
literacy and numeracy” (Ministry of Education, Jamaica, 1977:32) and so an
innovation like PRIMER was seen as helping to address this problem. However,
from the perspective of the teachers in the PRIMER pilot schools, the project
failed to respond to their personal needs. They were disappointed in not
having received any recognition for the extra work they had done, while the
principals of the schools felt that the project had not ‘put their schools on
the map’, as it should have done (Jennings1993:532).
In terms of compatibility
to their values and needs, the teachers felt that the use of self instructional
materials (SIM) in PRIMER fostered the development of independent study skills
which they valued, but they felt insecure in the new role they were expected to
adopt as facilitators of learning. Some teachers expressed the view that the
SIM were of more use to them as textbooks than to the pupils. The Grade 10 -11
Programme was introduced into the Jamaican Secondary school system in an era
when stated educational goals referred to "the creation of an
egalitarian society based on the twin pillars of social justice and equality of
opportunity" (Ministry of Education, Jamaica 1977:5) but it was
introduced only into one school type. The thinking was that if students
graduating from the New Secondary schools had been exposed to a curriculum
that gave them skills for the world of work and also had work
experience, this would make them more competitive since their peers
from the prestigious high schools would have academic qualifications but
no work experience. But in the eyes of employers, these academic qualifications
still gave the high school graduate the competitive edge. The R&T also
suffered from different perceptions of its value. The newly upgraded high
schools (formerly New Secondary schools) and the Junior High Schools
(formerly All –Age) valued ROSE highly not only because they had
benefited from a change in name and status but also, for the first time,
they were given curriculum guides, textbooks, and curriculum materials,
and received some supervision from the Ministry of Education (Evans
1997). The Traditional High Schools, on the other hand, considered they
had little to gain from the introduction of ROSE, and questioned the value of a
common curriculum for all types of secondary school. For one thing,
the teachers felt it was an erosion of their social status and traditional
academic standards for a common curriculum to put them on par with the former
New Secondary and All Age Schools. Most traditional high schools either ignored
the R&T or relegated its use for the low achievers.
Clarity about goals and means and complexity are
related. Complexity refers to “the difficulty and extent of change required of
the individuals responsible for implementation” (Fullan & Stiegelbauer,
1991:71). Simple changes can be made clear easily while the means
for achieving goals of more complex changes may not be so easily communicated.
The CXC, for example, has over the years organized training for teachers to
ensure that they became clear about how to use the techniques of assessment
related to the CSEC. Indeed, this was a major objective of the Secondary
Curriculum Development Project funded by the USAID (Griffith 1981), but the use
of school based assessment continues to pose difficulties for teachers
particularly in terms of its demand on their time and the clarity of means of
assessment. In the case of PRIMER there was a general lack of clarity as to
what the project was supposed to achieve and how it was supposed to do so.
Teachers perceived the use of SIM as complex largely because they were too
advanced for the pupils for whom they were written on account of their low
reading ability. A serious problem, furthermore, was the fact that
members of the project team were not altogether clear in their own minds about
the use of SIM and they w ere unable to conceptualize the new behaviour
required of the teachers and communicate this to them (Minott, 1988). The
difficulties experienced with the Grade 10/11 Programme stemmed from the
remarkable speed of the change process.
From May throughout the summer of 1974, the curriculum development and
diffusion process proceeded at an unprecedented pace. What had originally
been slated to take place in one year was squashed into a period of less than
six months. Because an individualised instructional format was being used
for the first time with these curricula, it was necessary to initiate both
students and teachers into the skills and techniques involved in using these
materials effectively. Again this was accomplished with remarkable speed,
largely through the use of the media. 'Model' classes were selected to
demonstrate the new methods on television and radio. This was hardly the
ideal way of giving users the on-going support needed during implementation of
an innovation.
Difficulties were
experienced in implementing the methodology of the GMP. The technique involved
the teacher asking each pupil a lot of questions and to explain
their answers or their thinking process. Being questioned was an unusual
experience for most of the pupils. Cumberbatch (1972) also underscored the
inhibition of Guyanese children and pointed out the difficulty that teachers
experienced in drawing out the child, either because of the child's
self-consciousness, feelings of inferiority or “unenlightened teacher reaction
to his indigenous language forms " (ibid., p.5), which make
him passive. Such passivity is not conducive to situations in which “pupils
direct questions not only at the teacher but also at one another". Most
schools experienced difficulty in implementing all five elements of R&T and
invariably they only managed two or three. This was largely due to lack of
adequate physical and material resources as well as the teachers capable of
teaching the areas. The mini-enterprises have also proven very difficult to
implement.
With regard to quality
and practicality, Doyle and Ponder (1977/78) refer to the ‘practicality
ethic’ of teachers, underscoring the fact that teachers are very practical in
their orientation. Consequently, innovations that involve use of curriculum
materials need to ensure that they are practical in the sense that they fit
well with the teachers’ situation and that they are of good quality. CSEC
scores high marks in this regard. The case of integrated science is a good
example. This subject was piloted for 5years in 30 schools in 7 participating
countries and feedback from this project led to substantial revisions (Jennings
1994). CSEC has also triggered a virtual revolution in the writing of textbooks
in the Caribbean, most of which are of a high quality and published by
international publishing houses. The textbooks and other materials written for
the GMP were developed by two leading mathematics educators in the region at
the time and the fact that they have served as models for primary math texts
produced in later years is testimony to their recognized quality. This cannot
be said of the other innovations. While the teachers’ guides for R&T were
of good quality, the teachers expressed reservations over the quality of the
workbooks for the students. The materials developed by the PRIMER writers
were poor in quality and impracticable. This is evident from the fact that some
89% of the fourth form pupils for whom they were intended were found to be
reading below the grade 2 level (Jennings, 1994). The speed with which the
G10/11 was developed militated against the production of materials of good
quality. One researcher described the production of Grade 10 materials in
Language Arts as a ‘high-pressurised operation’. Units were late in
production. Great emphasis was placed on getting materials into the hands of
students since the individualised format was being utilised. Consequently, the
teacher's guides accompanying the students' materials usually went out late,
and would reach the teachers after the students had covered the materials in
their booklets (Miller, 1981). Furthermore, the units had to be sent to
the Ministry before their revision was completed. This meant that
improvements to draft units were sometimes not incorporated into the finished
product, because of the pressure to meet deadlines. Such pressures did not
allow for testing the materials in the schools and writers had to rely on
feedback in the form of odd comments from students and teachers.
Characteristics at the School level
The strategy used for
introducing innovation into school systems can impact positively or negatively
on the implementation process. The power-coercive or ‘top-down’ approach
has been particularly influential in developing countries since the
1960s.A repeated criticism of this approach, however, is that despite massive
investment in centrally developed innovations, invariably the result has
had little, if any impact at all at the classroom level. Since the
970s there has been strong advocacy for a ‘bottom-up’ approach wherein teachers
are accorded greater participation in decision-making processes
(e.g. whether they should participate in the project or not, or be involved in
the curriculum development process) on the grounds that this would not only
generate more realistic and relevant curricula but would enable more effective
implementation of the latter.
As is evident from Table 2,
the ’top-down’ strategy for change was used for all the innovations, but
in some provision was made for teacher participation. In the CSEC,
for example, teacher participation was facilitated through the use of subject
panels. These consist of six members of the education systems of the
participating countries, three of which must be practicing teachers of the
subject at the level of the examination. These panels are appointed by the
School Examination Committee to develop syllabuses, recommend methods of
testing, receive criticisms and suggestions from teachers and consider examiners’
reports. In the case of the PEP the strategy used involved the
commissioning of subject specialists in each of the four core areas of the
primary curriculum. These specialists came from the UWI or the Ministries of
Education in the region. Each subject specialist collected syllabi,
teachers' manuals and pupil materials from the participating territories and,
from an in-depth study of these, drafted revised syllabi. These syllabi were
then reviewed by teachers at workshops held at the regional, territorial and
local levels. Each participating territory selected two subject leaders who
were drawn from among curriculum officers in the Ministry of Education,
lecturers in the Teacher Training Colleges, primary school principals or
teachers. These subject leaders served as participants in regional
workshops and as resource persons and organizers of territorial and local
workshops. The principals and teachers in the PRIMER schools were not
involved in any of the decision-making processes. They felt that the decision
to participate in the project was thrust upon them. Three
principals expressed surprise that their schools were selected for the project,
while another was not at all sure why his school was chosen (Minott,
1988). Teacher participation was not a feature of the G10/11
either. Lecturers from the UWI and officers in the Ministry of Education were
commissioned to develop curricula in Language Arts, Social Studies,
Mathematics, Science and Life Skills.
The leadership role
played by the principal is critical to the success of any innovation and of
particular importance is on-going support necessary for teachers during
implementation. The leadership role that principals play has to be founded on a
sound knowledge of the process of change. They need to be sensitive to the fact
that an innovation deskills teachers in that it makes redundant all the wealth
of knowledge and skills that they have for dealing with problems that may arise
when they are using practices with which they have become comfortable. While principals
were generally supportive in the case of the CSEC and PEP, the PRIMER
team described the principals in the project schools as unsupportive; that
they only paid ‘lip-service’ to the project (Jennings, 1994:317) and that they
failed to give the teachers the help they needed and so the teachers were
unprepared to get to grips with the innovative ideas of the project.
However, the leadership at the project level had its weaknesses, as is evident
from the failure to ensure that the students’ reading levels were ascertained
before the writing of the self-instructional modules began.
This unpreparedness on the
part of the teachers in PRIMER has to be seen in light of their level of
training. Most of them were either untrained or were going through a
process of initial training which was not completed till after the termination
of the project. While all the principals were trained teachers, none had
training in educational administration. The training of both the
projects schools’ staff and the PRIMER team was inadequate both in terms of
duration and content. There is some discrepancy in the record of how much
training was done. McKinley (1981) reported that the teachers were given
five weeks in-service training, while according to Cummings (1986) the teachers
received ten days training in the use of SIM. In any case, it appears that the
training never really gave the teachers the real help they needed. They
reported that they would have liked the PRIMER team to give them demonstrations
in the use of SIM which would have shown them specifically how to take on the
new role required (Minott, 1988).
Training to implement
an innovation really needs to be on-going at the school level in order to be
effective, but as Table 2 indicates provision needs to be made for training at
the national level. This takes the form of training organized by
the Ministry of Education, often becoming an integral part of pre-service
training at the Teachers Colleges. In 1975, in the G10/11, seven
Implementation Officers were selected from amongst classroom teachers who were
judged to have achieved success with the programme during the previous
year. They were used to help classroom teachers with any problems that
they encountered in the programme but they could hardly be considered adequate
support for teachers in over sixty schools. In the G10/11 also the lack of
training of teachers was a major cause of the eventual demise of the Life
Skills curriculum while in the R&T, while the Teachers Colleges have
staff designated for training for the ROSE programme, research has highlighted
weaknesses in the training in the methodology for R&T (Brown et al., 1998).
As mentioned earlier, CXC has put much emphasis on the training of teachers,
but at the same time expects individual countries to undertake initiatives that
would help their teachers to implement innovative ideas. Some territories have
organized training workshop successfully and the Curriculum Development Unit of
the Ministry of Education in Trinidad and Tobago has produced a handbook on
school-based assessment (SBA) in physics, using the expertise of its graduate
teachers. Schools of Education and other departments at the UWI also organize
training workshops for CSEC.
The two consultants and the
Mathematics specialists in the Curriculum Development Centre in Guyana held
Mathematics teaching laboratories across Guyana in an effort to introduce the
teachers to the use of the new methodology in the GMP Between May and
June in 1975, for example, the team held three teaching laboratories in
different educational districts. Apart from giving practice in the use of
the teaching strategies, these laboratories were designed to allow
teachers to practice the skills that were needed to support the materials
developed; for example, use of objectives in teaching, thinking of evaluation
as a way of making decisions about teaching, and for providing teachers with
the necessary mathematical background for teaching the content of the
curriculum guide (Ministry of Education, 1975:4).
The PEP materials
were implemented in schools in the participating territories and the general
practice was for teachers to adapt the materials to suit the particular
circumstances in the territories. Following the close of the project,
subject leaders and teachers in the project schools were expected to visit
schools and give any necessary guidance to teachers in the wider school system
that were using the materials. However, the evaluators of the project reported
that some of the subject leaders were unsuitably qualified and that "most
were inexperienced in curriculum development" (Massanari and Miller,
1985:52) and had to learn by doing. There were even cases where subject
leaders left the project and were never replaced. The evaluators further
describe the rate of turnover of subject leaders, principals and teachers
as "a major constraint on project implementation" (ibid.,
p.53) in some territories. In addition, the level of training of teachers in
the pilot schools was low, as the evaluators observed: "Several countries
had teaching forces of which nearly two-thirds were unqualified. Some
teachers not only lacked professional training but also basic academic
competence-displaying serious gaps in knowledge of content"
(Massanari and Miller, 1985:52).
When teachers attend
training workshops especially during term time, they usually need the support
of other colleagues in overseeing their classes during their
absence. The support received is variable and generally depends on the climate
of support set by the leadership in the schools. In my discussions with
teachers of R&T and those familiar with the G10/11 the ones
who received support from colleagues are those whose principals encourage
supportive relationships amongst their teachers. Invariably,
however, one hears criticisms of teachers who attend workshops in posh hotels
where their main concern is with the menu and on their return to schools are
unwilling to share the knowledge gained with their colleagues. At the same time
there are cases where the climate of the school is of such that the colleagues
are not receptive to the new ideas that the teacher is willing to share from
the workshop. All of this relates back to the nature of the leadership in the
schools. Training workshops for CSEC tend to be organized during week
ends or holiday periods at times when classes are not affected.
For the work of the school
to succeed, whether the school is involved in an innovative effort or not, the
support of the community is very important. More and more schools in the Caribbean
area looking to their communities for support in terms of
providing material resources and equipment which their budgetary
allocation cannot cover, and to assist in fund-raising drives. The
schools also rely on members of their communities with the required skills to
assist the schools from time to time with their labour in improving the school
premises or assisting the teachers in the classrooms. This is the sort of help
that PRIMER had envisaged from the communities in which the project was
located. It did not materialize, however, because after some
initial support in terms of cleaning up and painting school buildings, interest
on the part of the community waned after it became clear that the government
was not making nay effort to construct new buildings or refurbish old ones as
promised. Although it was surrounded with much scepticism in its early
years, the communities in which the schools are located are supportive of CSEC,
and over the years the initial anxieties over the international acceptability
of the examination have been allayed. Most importantly, CSEC has received the
support of governments in the Region.
A final factor to be
considered at the school level is the location of the school. While
there is no research evidence on this with respect to the other innovations, in
the case of PRIMER this proved to be an important factor. The PRIMER schools
were generally inaccessible. Public transport was not available in the area and
they had to be approached on foot over rough and rocky roads. This proved
problematic in the monitoring of the schools by the PRIMER project team.
Distances between the schools exacerbated the problem. The project schools were
some 60 miles from Kingston, the headquarters of the PRIMER team, while each
school was between 5 and 15 miles from the headquarters from which the project
was coordinated in Mandeville, the nearest town.
Characteristics at the national level and
external to national system
The relationship between
the PRIMER team and the teachers in the project schools deteriorated over time.
The teachers perceived the team as highly critical of them, bent on assessing
rather than helping and making them feel inadequate and incompetent. They felt
threatened, pressurized by ‘too many changes coming too quickly’ and they
expressed fear of failure both on their own and their pupils’ part. A member of
the PRIMER team likened the situation to a ‘battle being waged’, with the
teachers employing various strategies to prevent the team from observing them
(Jennings, 1993). In the case of the G10/11 the problematic relationship
was between the Ministry of Education officials and the
Government (i.e. Office of the Prime Minister), Ministry of Education officials were asked by
the Government to design and develop the curricula as quickly as
possible. It appears, however, that these officials resented Government
manipulation in this way and action was very slow. Dissatisfied with this
inertia, the Government intervened. There was a 'shake-up' of top Ministry of
Education officials and, in April 1974, the Grade 10 -11 Programme was made a
'special project' in the Prime Minister's office with its own budget and
specially recruited staff. This enabled the curriculum development
process to proceed at a remarkable pace.
One of the most critical
determinants of thee fate of an innovation is “the continuity and commitment of
those individuals responsible for its development and their immediate
successors” (Cummings, 1986:20). In terms of staff to support the
innovation PRIMER suffered miserably. The team never had its full
complement of staff. During the second year of the project half the writing
staff left. During the lifetime of the project over one-third of the original
teachers left the schools. There was no editor for the materials developed and
use of persons on a part time basis to edit proved counterproductive. Members
of the PRIMER team found themselves ‘doubling up’ and operating in areas beyond
their competence. The Project Director, for example, had to double up as a
curriculum analyst. In the case of CSEC lack of staff in certain subjects has
resulted in a reduction in the number of students taking the examination (e.g.
physics, geography) and there are cases of schools having to cease offering
subjects (e.g. French) on account of the same problem.
The importance of materials
being of good quality and practical has already been discussed. Adequate lead
time is needed for such materials to be developed and it usually
requires a process whereby the draft materials are field-tested and evaluated
and revisions or modifications made on the basis of the feedback from the
evaluation before they are finally produced for system-wide dissemination. The
PRIMER team took about one year to write the self instructional materials
for language arts, but they did this before they had the results of
a diagnostic test of the students’ reading ability .Their time was
wasted as the materials were way above the students’ level of ability. In
their effort to modify the materials in time for the new school year, the
PRIMER team had to work under so much pressure that it never had the time
to do anything well. Interestingly, in Malaysia which had a similar
project to PRIMER called INSPIRE (Integrated System of Programmed
Instruction for Rural Environments) the project staff also had to work
under pressure to meet deadlines but in the end produced materials
of good quality. Apart from excellent editing, time was taken to try out the
materials in laboratory schools and final revisions were made before they were
put into the schools (Cummings, 1986). CXC allots reasonable time for the
development of subject syllabuses. For example, two years (1975-77) were taken
up with the development of subject syllabuses in the five subjects that were
first offered for examination in 1979.
The miraculous speed with
which materials were developed for theG10/11 has already been mentioned.
Although it has long been recognised that there were some serious weaknesses in
the units of certain subject areas, for example, the Social Studies and the
“Life skills” curricula, these remained unmodified for many years. Certain
Social Studies units, for example, were criticised for the 'anti-imperialist'
propaganda projected by the writers, and for their blatant attempt to
indoctrinate students into socialist ideology. There was, at one time, an
outcry from some sections of the public against the images of violence in the
illustrations of the Language Arts materials. The lack of revision, however,
was due in no small measure to the lack of funds triggered by a deepening of
the economic crisis in Jamaica in 1978. Financial constraints also
necessitated the withdrawal of the Implementation Officers, - which in turn
resulted in the breakdown of communication with the classroom teachers.
This also brought to an end the feedback from these teachers, on which the
modification of curricula was based.
Funding cuts or losses is one of the ‘environmental
turbulences’ (Miles, 1983) which threaten the institutionalization of
innovations. The larger the external resource, the less likely the effort will
be continued since governments, already under financial pressure, are unlikely
to be able to add the cost to their regular budgets. PRIMER fell victim to this
threat. Once the IDRC funds had ceased there was no attempt to secure
alternative sources of funding for the innovation. Since 1972 CXC has survived
many changes of government in its participating countries and the examining
body relies on those countries for financial support. Examination fees are an
important source of funds, but CXC has been able to attract funds from donor
agencies for special training or curriculum development projects. Financial constraints were also at the
root of the demise of the PEP. While advising against each territory producing
its own set of materials, Massanari and Miller (1985) foresaw the costliness of
commercial publishing. Although there was much discussion about it at one
time, the commercial publishing of the PEP materials was never realised. A
major reason for this was the fact that the materials produced were not
camera-ready and needed extensive editing in order to serve all territories in
common. Neither the individual territories nor the proposed publisher was
prepared to bear the cost of this exercise. As long as the G10/11 remained as a
special project in the Office of the Prime Minister, it was assured of adequate
funds. However these halcyon days lasted for only two years. After that the
programme was relocated into the Core Curriculum Unit of the Ministry of
Education where it vied for its share of whatever funds were available. Once
funding for the first phase of the ROSE programme had ended, there were no
special funds from the Government for the R&T. The fate of R&T rested
squarely on the shoulders of the principals and teachers in the schools.
Then there is the matter of
foreign technical assistance. As table 2 shows, of the
innovations studied, only one tried to ‘go it alone’. The team that negotiated
for PRIMER with the IDRC convinced the funding agency that Jamaica had a cadre
of well-qualified educators who were capable of managing the project without
any outside help. And yet experience elsewhere has underscored the importance
of such help. PRIMER was modelled on ideas in Project IMPACT in the Philippines
And apart from PRIMER there were four other IMPACT-related projects in
Indonesia, Malaysia Bangladesh and Liberia. All of these benefited from foreign
technical assistance and all achieved varying degrees of success. That such
assistance can be beneficial to recipients, is further underscored by McGinn et
al. (1979) who argue that a major reason for the success of educational reform
efforts in Chile and El Salvador in the 1960s was the fact that these countries
“had more than ordinary amounts of fiscal and human resources available
through international technical assistance” (McGinn et al., 1979:222).
Provision for research
and evaluation in the innovations was variable. Workshops
conducted in the GMP were evaluated, but there was no summative evaluation of
the GMP as a project. The PEP, however, had summative evaluators. In its
design, PRIMER attached a great deal of importance to both research and
evaluation. Five All- Age schools with similar characteristics to the project
schools and which were located in the same geographical area were designated
control schools. A pre-post test experimental design was envisaged and there
were plans to conduct formative evaluations to provide information on the
outcomes of the instructional strategies used. These, however, did not
materialize because after the evaluator appointed at the commencement of the
project resigned, there was no replacement. Evaluation of CSEC is provided for
through a system of annual reports on the performance of students in each
subject in each participating country and regular meetings to assess the
conduct of the examinations, using foreign technical assistance when necessary.
Some Implications
In the preceding section I
examined the extent to which those responsible for managing the implementation
of the innovations planned for implementation by taking into consideration the
factors that affect the process. Of the 21 factors, 19 were present in
CSEC, the most successful (see Table 2) while only 2 were present in PRIMER
which has to be deemed a failure. This suggests that while the implementation
of the former was well planned, PRIMER was poorly planned. The other
innovations studied succeeded to some extent. But by what standards are
they being judged? There are three main points that I would wish to make in
addressing this question?
(i) The success of an innovation has to be
judged by more than one standard
Firstly, as Table 1 shows,
the success of an innovation cannot be judged by one standard alone. Of the
innovations studied, the most successful has been the CSEC. It is the only one
whose success can be judged by the standard of longevity based on
the quarter century criterion of Cuban mentioned earlier. The CXC itself was
established in 1972, but its initiation can be traced as far back as 1948 in
Eric Williams’ book -The Making of the British West Indies which was published
in 1948 - in which he called for the setting up of the University of the West
Indies and an examination system relevant to the Caribbean. Eric Williams was
the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago at the time that the CXC was
established. Indeed CSEC could not have been introduced without the support of
most of the Governments in the English-speaking Caribbean. While many may
be critical of the top-down strategy for change, CSEC is clearly one where it
worked because with the support from the governments, there were numerous
platforms from which to persuade the general public of the need, relevance
and value of the Caribbean’s own examination system. It is by such
advocacy that popular appeal is won. But it is not only by the longevity and
popularity standard that CSEC can be judged successful but also by the standard
of adaptability. It was pointed out earlier that secondary schools have for
years exercised the freedom to determine their lower secondary curriculum. What
most of these schools actually did was to adapt the CXC syllabuses to suit the
needs of their grades 7-9. The CSEC is also strong on the fidelity standard.
Core features of CSEC have remained faithful to what the originators intended;
for example, how syllabuses are developed, the operation of Subject Panels,
etc. So, few schools have been able to implement all five elements of R&T
that it fails miserably on the fidelity standard.
(ii) Performance on the effectiveness standard
Secondly what is evident
from the discussion in this paper is that if the effectiveness standard is
applied, most of the innovations would fail miserably. This applies even to the
CSEC which fares so well when judged by the other standards.
While the CXC has been successful in introducing exams to replace
the GCE ‘O’ Level and in developing syllabuses relevant to the region, it
is widely recognized that the CSEC does not test a wide ability range,
even though this was the original intention
in offering the examination at two levels :the general proficiency
(GP) level for those students who were
preparing for further study at college or university and the
basic proficiency (BP) level for the less academically able
who did not want to go on to further study. The BP proved
unattractive to students as well as to prospective employers who
tended to opt for applicants with qualifications at the GP level. The latter
were largely those from the traditional high schools. CSEC in fact tests
between 20% to 45% of the relevant age cohort at the secondary level in
countries like Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad, with the larger percentages being
in the latter two countries. In Jamaica ‘mock exams’ are
used in some schools as a selection device to weed out those
students likely to reduce their pass rate and jeopardize their
ranking on the league table for CSEC passes.
Some of the innovations
fare badly on the effectiveness standard because the goals they set
out to achieve were far too grandiose and unrealistic to achieve within
the life of a project and educational planners have been remiss in
not thinking through how specially funded projects become
integrated into the normal operations of Ministries of
Education so as to contribute towards the achievement of
national educational goals. The G10/11 is a case to point. By the mid-1980s the self instructional materials
had either disappeared completely from the classrooms of a number of New
Secondary schools or, where they were available in small quantities, the
students had to share them or the teachers used them as textbooks
(Jennings-Wray et al., 1985). By then the rationale for their use
appeared to have been forgotten because the dominance of the teachers in the
classrooms was much in evidence as the UNESCO Report (1983) noted that most of
them dictated or had students copy notes. Not only did the use of the
self-instructional materials not result in the development of self-reliance and
the independent approach to learning that the government had hoped, but the
objective of tackling the unemployment problem was not realised either.
Research has consistently shown that New Secondary School graduates experience
difficulty in finding jobs after leaving school. In their investigation
of the first graduates of the Grade 10 -11 programme, Lowe and Mahy (1978)
found that those who specialised in Business Education and Industrial Arts were
likely to find jobs, but those who did Agriculture tended to opt for jobs in
areas outside their field of specialisation. Later research has shown
that while some students got jobs in the places where they did their work
experience, many of them were unemployed (Jennings-Wray and Teape 1982).
In the case of
the ROSE programme, the study by Evans (1998) showed that the
teachers varied in their ability to implement student-centred teaching.
Some showed little understanding of group work and while they placed students
in groups they used the group activity for individual reading. Others
made little attempt to alter their teaching method; and they relied on
expository teaching or lecturing, and written work on the chalkboard for
students to copy in their notebooks Rainford (1998) conducted research on the
science curriculum in the ROSE programme, which included an examination of the
knowledge of science content and the acquisition of process skills according to
school type. Her findings showed that students from the Traditional High
Schools outperformed the Junior High Schools on their knowledge of science
content. Rainford concluded that students exposed to the science curriculum in
the ROSE programme were not learning as much as they should in science, and
that “although all types of schools have access to the same curriculum, it
seems that the quality of education is not the same among them” (Ibid., p.
87). The Junior High school students remain just as much at a disadvantage as
before, on account of teacher quality, school facilities and the ability of
their students. Thus, ROSE’s attempt to change pedagogy as a means of improving
educational quality and equity had floundered.
Research on
R&T raises questions as to whether it is in fact maintaining its focus on
using technology to provide solutions to problems. The physical and
material resources (including relevant textbooks) and equipment needed by the
schools are not adequately provided for. In fact, a survey by Brown (et
al., 1998) revealed that, of the schools in the survey, none had all the
recommended items for teaching all the elements, and for those elements being
offered, some schools had none of the equipment. There is also clear
evidence that teachers and students from the Traditional High Schools are not
taking to R&T in the same way as their counterparts in the Junior High and
Comprehensive High Schools. Their attitude to R&T is negative (Jennings,
1998). Furthermore, while many teachers thought the integrated approach
to teaching R&T was appropriate, as it enabled the students to see the
linkage between subjects, many were not effectively using the thematic approach
to teaching, and so the integration of the elements of R&T was not taking
place. Training for integration as well as time in school for team
planning to effect integration, difficulty in addressing themes and in covering
the content of the syllabus adequately, the low proficiency and literacy levels
of students were other difficulties apparent in the schools. Evidence
suggests that affective goals relating to the achievement of cooperation, peer
appreciation and tolerance through group work are also not being achieved; and
many teachers were of the view that instruction in the different elements in
R&T was inadequate in laying the foundation for the CSEC syllabus which the
students need to cover in the upper grades (Brown et al., 1998).
If the ideas in the GMP
were implemented effectively, one would expect to see this reflected in
performance at the Secondary School Entrance Examination (SSEE) which is taken
by children of age 11 + for entry to secondary
schools. From an examination of the SSEE Mathematics results for the
whole of Guyana over a ten year period (1981-1991), Goolsarran (1992) reported
that, where the maximum score was 60, the mean score in this examination ranged
from as low as 13.16 in 1984 to 19.70 in 1988. The more visionary goals of the
project such as developing self reliance, a cooperative approach
to problem –solving were not achieved, one reason being certain
cultural characteristics rooted in the society such as the inhibition of
Guyanese discussed earlier. And so in classrooms where we should have
been seeing problem –solving through cooperative learning, recall of information
remained the dominant way of learning.
In discussing the impact of
the PEP, Massanari and Miller described it as "a watershed in Caribbean
Education" (ibid., p153, and as an "outstanding success"
(ibid., p. 206). The Social Studies curriculum, they claimed, revolutionised
the teaching of Social studies in the participating territories, while the
Primary Science curriculum succeeded in demystifying Science as the preserve of
the academically brilliant. But the true measure of the impact of a curriculum
project, however, lies in the use of the products in classrooms in ways that
make a real difference to teaching and learning. Massanari and Miller's
evaluation of the PEP did not provide any evidence of this. That the PEP
succeeded in getting some CARICOM Member States to develop supplementary
materials for use in their own schools, underscores the positive outgrowth of
collaborative action in the region. On the other hand, the fact that the
project did not achieve the desired goal of commercial publication was not just
a matter of cost. It can also be seen as the persistence of individual
territories to guard their own identities by ensuring that whatever goes into
their education systems bears their own stamp. The absence of a strong
regional identity and the concern of individual territories to forge their own
national identities, bolster national sentiments, instead of a regional
consciousness which would have supported the use of common curricula in the
primary systems of the region.
From the preceding, it is
evident that although Cuban (1998) maintains that the effectiveness standard is
the primary one used by most policy makers, media editors, etc, in judging the
success of an innovation it is not an easy standard to measure. This is not
only because the use of test results is inadequate but also because innovations
usually have more than one goal and not all can be measured quantifiably. The
results of the SSEE for the GMP tell us nothing about the achievement of the
more affective goals.
(iii) Forgotten but not gone: infusion of core
ideas
The third observation
brings me back to where I started in this paper. When I look at my red jasper
pendant, what I see is a beautiful semi-precious stone. And yet I always
remember that once it was a jagged piece of red rock that I picked up at my
feet in the Kato area of Guyana. But who will remember these years from now
when my pendant survives me and ends up at an antique auction perhaps?
The fate of some
innovations is not far different from this. We don’t hear about the G10/11
today. In its heyday, it had the most potent advocate of all-Prime
Minister Michael Manley, one of the most popular and charismatic leaders that
Jamaica has had since its independence. The G10/11 benefited from his
popularity. The Budget Debate Speech in
1973 when the decision to initiate the Grade 10 -11 Programme was announced was
the first one of Manley’s Democratic Socialist Government that had been elected
to office the previous year. The G10/11 was like a keeping of a promise
to faithful voters who had brought the party to power. But with its
removal from the Prime Minister’s office, the programme lost its popular
appeal. Much of what was associated with it, for example the Life Skills
Curriculum (which in later years was dubbed ‘the Dead Skills’ curriculum)
we would prefer not to remember and yet there are certain core elements
of the G10/11, like ‘life skills’ itself and the work
experience programme which have become mainstream features of secondary
education. Ideas from the Guyana Maths Project were infused into the Skills
Reinforcement Guides developed by the National Centre for Educational Resource
Development in Guyana in the early 1990s (Jennings 1993) and the cooperative
approach to learning and the development of problem solving skills are core
elements in the teaching of mathematics and numeracy in the primary curriculum
in most if not all Caribbean countries today. The PEP has long since been
washed out to sea by unrelenting currents, but it too has left its mark in
that it served as a stimulus to the reform of existing syllabuses
in some participating territories. For example, with financial assistance
from the Organisation for Cooperation in Overseas Development (OCOD),
Mathematics resource teachers in St. Kitts and Nevis, under the guidance of
Mathematics tutors from the Teachers College, prepared a curriculum guide to
supplement the PEP materials developed for Mathematics. This guide
provided, inter alia, an outline of the scope and sequence of the Primary Mathematics
curriculum for St. Kitts/Nevis (Jennings, 2002).It can therefore be said that
the G10/11, the GMP, the PEP are like the red jagged pieces of rock which were
shaped into semi-precious stones, because something of them have survived in
the new initiatives that followed them. Cuban (1998) made a similar observation
about the Platoon schools. They are largely forgotten today , he says,
“yet the core notions of using buildings fully; offering a diversified
curriculum combining academic subjects, practical tasks, and play… have become
mainstream features of elementary schooling” (p 454).
(iv) Adaptability is common to all successful
innovations
The fourth observation
evident from table 1 is that adaptability is common to all the innovations that
succeeded, even to some extent. Indeed, their adaptability was highlighted
explicitly by their developers. For example, to ensure that cultural concerns
unique to a particular territory were addressed, the developers of the PEP
materials advised teachers to adapt the materials, as is evident from this
statement from the Social Studies team: “Although this programme is structured,
there is flexibility in both content and activities to permit a teacher to
adapt to local and pupils' needs and to the availability of instructional materials
(PEP Social Studies Curriculum Outline, 1985:2).
Usually innovations go
through a process of mutual adaptation (Mclaughlin, 1976) wherein the
innovation is adapted and the user adapts his /her situation to accommodate the
innovation. Based on his experience with a literacy project designed to
promote leisure reading among reluctant readers in secondary schools in a
Caribbean country, Warrican (2006) wrote: ‘if teachers can see that they can
adapt a solution to fit their circumstances….. they are more likely to
adopt a change and see it as their own” (p12).
The R&T is implemented
differently in each school, depending on the resources available. Very few
schools are able to implement the Visual Arts element due to a
shortage of teachers trained in that area. All involved in R&T have
had to adapt in some way or other. Because the schools do not have
the resources, the onus has been put on students to provide materials needed
for making products. Teachers of R&T have had to become accustomed to doing
many things differently. For example, they have had to adapt themselves
to a team approach to planning and doing this planning during school
time. This same cooperative endeavour they have also had to encourage in
the students, particularly through group work. The teachers have also had
to adopt a more student-centred and integrated approach to teaching, new
assessment procedures, improved record keeping and they have had to learn to be
resourceful. For example, one teacher commented on ‘having to teach
keyboarding skills to a group of 51 with only 10 typewriters’ (Jennings,
1998:42).
There is an absence of
local research on how teachers adapt curricula and how mutual adaptation
actually takes place. The research by Drake et al (2006) in the UK which
found that teachers had different ‘models of curriculum use’ as they adapted a
mathematics reform –based curriculum is illuminating in this regard. In the
Caribbean there is a tendency to think that although teachers are encouraged to
adapt curricula, they often use the curriculum guide as a blueprint since the
curriculum is presented to them as a package. In
the PEP Social Studies curriculum, for example, each lesson outline
begins with a statement of the theme, the topic based on the theme, organising
concepts and generalizations, main ideas and the skills to be developed.
This is followed by a statement of behavioural objectives, content outline and
suggested activities. In some cases, there are even suggestions on
'Teacher Preparation', i.e. what the teacher should do to ensure adequate
preparation for the lesson. Sample questions are also given together with
background information on the topic and some evaluation exercises. While the
teachers are advised to modify the outlines to suit their individual
situations, the outlines are so detailed as to leave little to the imagination
and inventiveness of the teachers. Many are indeed reduced to 'passive
consumers' (Jennings 2002).
Conclusion
To judge an educational
innovation or change as either a success or a failure is to
misrepresent reality. They succeed to varying degrees and, rather like rocks
which the relentless currents wear away over the years and shape into stones of
different hue and form, these innovations are also worn away over time
but something of them endures in initiatives that come after them.
Change and durability are to rocks and stones as they are to educational
innovations. It is the rare one, however, that seemingly vanishes without a
trace, like the stone worn away by the currents over the years until it
disintegrates to grains in a white-sanded Caribbean beach. This paper has
provided one example. PRIMER was closed down following the original experiment
(and half a million Canadian dollars added to Jamaica’s national debt) and not
surprisingly, since an IDRC official on a visit to the project schools observed
‘one has to look very hard to detect the innovation in use within Project
PRIMER’ (Stromquist, 1982:7). But Table 2 shows how relentless the
currents wore away the fabric needed to sustain the innovation. The
supports that were needed for it to be implemented successfully
were just not there: the users being convinced of its need
and relevance, provision of good quality materials, participation
in decision-making on the part of those responsible for implementing the
ideas, lead time for materials development, provision for evaluation,
principals’ support for the teachers, support from the community. CSEC had all
of these stacked in its favour.
But there are some
educational innovations which seem born to die. Educational planners in
developing countries can do much to rescue their countries from some
indebtedness, if they only heed the signs. For PRIMER there were two signs
early in its life which showed the writing on the wall. Firstly, soon after the
proposal for PRIMER was accepted, the IDRC changed its priorities from
involvement in high-cost development projects such as PRIMER to research
(Cummings, 1986).Because the funding agency lost interest in PRIMER it did
nothing to intervene when there were clear signs even in the early days of the
project that things were not going well. Its lack of intervention has been
attributed to the funding agency’s policy of not being overly directive but
simply getting its officers to visit project sites and to “share their
reflections with project staff and generally avoid.. …offering unsolicited
advice” (Cummings, 1986, p.13). Secondly, the government that negotiated
the funding of PRIMER by the IDRC was defeated in the General Elections of
October 1980.This was just about one year after the project was
initiated. Every one of influence who could have served as an advocate
for PRIMER was removed from office. The new government, while giving verbal
support to PRIMER, watched as it drowned when funding from the donor agency
ceased. PRIMER failed to achieve its objectives and so was ineffective.
It was never implemented as originally conceived. It left nothing to be
adapted, and its life was nipped in the bud.
So what have we learnt from
all of this? I would hope that we have a better understanding of how
critical effective implementation is to the success of an innovation and that
judgments about the success of an innovation should take these factors into consideration.
Using particular criteria to evaluate success is a complex undertaking because
innovations have multiple goals the achievement of which has to be judged by
different standards. Some goals are achieved, others are not. We have
also learnt that most innovations do not die as their core ideas are taken up
by initiatives that succeed them; that adaptability is a characteristic common
to all the innovations that succeed.
That all of this
gives a sense of continuity and durability in the change
process may serve as some solace to those of us who are concerned
about the project –driven nature of our education systems in the
Caribbean: a new project replaces the old in five year cycles
and we seemingly continue to step in the same river twice. But I would
hope that it has also struck pangs of conscience in the hearts of initiators of
projects such as PRIMER. The fact that evaluation and research tend not to be
built into such projects has the effect of absolving such persons from
accountability. Yet no project leaves the schools in which it is implemented
unscathed. What happened to the teachers and principals in the PRIMER schools
during and after its termination? Were their relationships affected? Most
importantly how did the project’s failure impact on the children in those
schools? Did we stand by and watch as they too drowned with the project? We
should have answers to these questions. We should be more accountable for what
happens in all our schools, but even more so in schools where innovations fail.
Tables
Factors affecting the
implementation of selected educational innovations in the Caribbean
Key √ =present X =absent #
=present to some extent
A. Characteristics of the innovation
G10/11 R&T CSEC
PMR PEP
GMP
|
(1) Need and Relevance
Innovation is perceived as relevant to community/societal needs |
√ |
√ |
√ |
# |
√ |
√ |
|
(2) Compatibility Innovation is
perceived as compatible to values, existing practices, etc. |
# |
# |
√ |
# |
√ |
√ |
|
(3) Complexity Innovation
is perceived as difficult to understand and use |
√ |
√ |
# |
√ |
√ |
√ |
|
(4) Clarity Innovation
goals are clear to users and means of implementation made explicit |
X |
# |
√ |
X |
# |
√ |
|
(5) Quality and Practicality Programme
materials are of good quality and practicable |
X |
# |
√ |
X |
X |
√ |
B. Characteristics at the school
level
G10/11 R&T
CSEC PMR
PEP GMP
|
(6) Participation Change
strategy involves participation by teachers and principals |
X |
X |
√ |
X |
√ |
X |
|
(7)Leadership Principals
offer good leadership |
# |
# |
√ |
X |
√ |
NE |
|
(8) Training Adequate and appropriate training
of teachers and principals |
X |
X |
√ |
X |
√ |
√ |
|
(9) Relationships Staff
relationships are healthy and supportive |
# |
# |
√ |
X |
NE |
NE |
|
(10)Community support The
community is involved and supportive |
# |
# |
√ |
X |
NE |
NE |
|
(11)School location Accessible and
allows easy communication with /by project team |
NE |
NE |
NE |
X |
NE |
NE |
C. Characteristics at the national
level
G10/11 R&T
CSEC PMR
PEP GMP
|
(12) Model of Change
Change strategy power coercive/top-down |
√ |
√ |
√ |
√ |
√ |
√ |
|
(13) Relationships good
relations between school /Ministry of Education staff and project
team /Government |
# |
NE |
√ |
X |
NE |
NE |
|
(14) Leadership Sound leadership
by project director |
√ |
√ |
√ |
X |
√ |
√ |
|
(15) Staffing Adequate
supply of staff in project team |
√ |
√ |
√ |
X |
√ |
√ |
|
(16) Evaluation & Research Provision
for continuous monitoring and evaluation |
X |
X |
√ |
X |
√ |
# |
|
(17) Government Support Continuing
government support |
√ |
X |
√ |
X |
X |
√ |
|
(18) Training Provision for ongoing
teacher training /staff development |
# |
X |
√ |
X |
X |
√ |
|
(19) Lead Time for materials
development Realistic time span for materials
development |
X |
√ |
√ |
X |
√ |
√ |
D. Characteristics external to the national
system
G10/11 R&T
CSEC PMR
PEP GMP
|
(20) Funding by donor agency
Realistic time span for funding |
X |
X |
√ |
X |
X |
NE |
|
(21) Technical assistance provision
of international /local technical assistance |
√ |
√ |
√ |
X |
√ |
√ |
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Dealing with the Historical
Paradoxes of a Globalized Educationalisation
– a way to write the “New” Cultural
History of Education?
Katholieke
Universiteit Leuven-Kortrijk,
Belgium
Marc.Depaepe@kuleuven-kortrijk.be
“I
am convinced that if we are not able to appreciate the relativity of the categories
we use, we run the risk of not gaining anything, and of losing everything”
(Eco, 1990, p. 111).
Every scientific discipline is continuously
subject to change. This truism applies both to the knowledge generated within a
particular field of research and to its educational translation into a teaching
subject. When the subject of “history of pedagogy” (conceived as a
history of educational thought) entered the curriculum of European universities
in the 19th century, the legislators had completely different
objectives and content in mind than the ones so-called “new cultural historians
of education” proclaim today (see, e.g., Compère 1995). That we ourselves
prefer to speak of “educational historiography” manifests this and illustrates
the historicity (and also relativity) of the developments in the history of the
“history of education” as a specific field of knowledge. Not only because such
an outcome is partly itself the result of historical processes, but also and in
particular because the process of knowing as such always takes place in a
perspectivist (and, therefore, to a certain degree also in a “presentistic”,
e.g. a time-bound) manner. Our observation of “reality” is made literally on
the basis of a particular (biological, historical, social, cultural,
ideological) “point of view” in time and space, while knowledge of (and
therefore thinking, speaking and writing about) this “reality” is always shaped
via the reductionist incision of the concrete word. Knowledge – and certainly
knowledge of the past - comes about via time-bound linguistic concepts, the
significance of which is predominantly dependent on the specificity of cultures
in which such concepts are used and therefore continuously varies in relation
to the present.
Epistemological step-up to a “new cultural
history of education”
In general historiography,
L. von Ranke is regarded as one of the founders of historicism. In the context
of this intellectual movement, attention was already being drawn to the
necessary historical content of phenomena. History had to be seen in relation
to the norms each age brought with it. They were thought of as being an
immanent part of the historical reality. They were active principles that gave
the past itself shape. The intervention of the historian was regarded as that
of a passive, photographic plate. His language was, as it were, a mirror of the
historical reality, without autonomy.
During the course of the 20th
century, however, it was realised that things are not as straightforward as
they appeared in the perspective of 19th-century historicism. The
historical reality is, to paraphrase the Dutch historian F.R. Ankersmit (1990,
1996), not a reality specified a priori but a reality that is only
created in the interpretation, thus, a posteriori. The historian
constructs the past within the contours of the applicable historiographic
tradition. By means of an historical story, a context in the past is created
that the past itself did not know. Every historical researcher inevitably
starts out from an artificially created collection of data that are grouped
(and regrouped) into a text, and this text, in the view of M. de Certeau
(1978), through its own structure and construction carries within it an unité
de sens. Language is thus not an autonomous mirror or a photographic plate.
It is, in fact, not a mirror at all; it represents the expression of ourselves
and of what structures our thoughts. Only in historical discussion, in
conversation with other researchers, does it articulate historical knowledge.
The forming of historical knowledge is, therefore, not to be sought in the past
itself but in the interpretative traditions of the “historiographic operation”,
which is related to the way in which the historical “evidence” is produced by
historians. It assumes a distance in time, which makes possible the projection,
the subjective historicity with which the researcher discovers and constructs
the “different” in and the “being different” of the past. Such historical
intervention, although it is never entirely “certain” of itself, is, however,
not necessarily pure fiction. To the extent that the manufacturing of the past,
in consultation with the usual practices of the present-day “historiographic
operation” is able to distinguish the false from the falsifiable, it can
undoubtedly lay claim to being scientific. The exercise of history – and here
de Certeau follows P. Ricoeur (2004, p.180), who sees the past as something
that is not but that has been – operates as critical hermeneutics. It arises
from the break with the myth and rhetoric that previous historiographers have
left behind and consequently results in something midway between “fiction” and
“science”.
The thought that all our
knowledge must be viewed as a conversation (and not as a correspondence between
knowledge and reality) has been developed in particular by the American
philosopher R. Rorty, who has also pointed to the significance of hermeneutics
in the debate on the theory of knowledge (Boomkens, 1992). According to Rorty
there is no neutral language of observation to which all scientific theories
(and more particularly what T.S. Kuhn has referred to as “paradigms”) can be
reduced, so that they can be compared with one another on the basis of their
relative plausibility. Knowledge presupposes the language in which it is
formulated, hence the epistemological need for interpretation and
interpretative skills. Within the scheme of contemporary time a bygone culture
can only be understood by engaging in a conversation with it, that it to say by
acquiring experience of it (through texts) and developing new concepts. Only in
such dialogue will we gradually be able to “seize” the past, which necessarily
presupposes a change in our own categories and standpoints. Meanwhile, this
blurred the distinction between philosophical argument and literary
story-telling (or narrative) and the distinction between the purity and
certainty of the avowed “objectivity” and the impurity and uncertainty of the
ubiquitous “subjectivity”. Rorty (1982) emerged as a supporter of a pluralistic
society, in which the novel, the literary story-telling, formed the core.
This “linguistic turn” led
in historiography to the strict division between historical science and
language also being overturned. For some, the blurring is so great that that
there is virtually no longer any difference between the historiographic novels
of historians and the novelised history of literary producers. However that may
be, the history business, as a result of the linguistic turn, has gained more
and more attention for the role of language, discursive practices, and the
narrative structures in historical story. “If the linguistic turn teaches us
anything, it teaches us to read differently, we must begin to write
differently. There is no single correct approach to reading a historical text;
there are only ways of reading. Different reading strategies will constitute a
historical text in different ways. The linguistic turn forces us to reconsider
what kind of act the writing of history is, what our forms of emplotment
permits or constraints, what kind of story we want to tell, and what kind of
story we actually do tell”, Cohen (1999, p. 81 f.) argues. The grand theory of
post-structuralists plays a decisive role in this new cultural history of
education, of which S. Cohen is only one exponent. There is
agreement with Foucault that it is not the unique human individual who is the
author of the text and the intentions contained in it, but the desubjectified
“exposition”: the principle of the grouping of words, as a unit and origin of
the meanings contained in it, and as a collecting point for the relationship
that exists between them (Ankersmit, 1996, p. 122 f.). Instead of dealing with
texts naively (as transparent windows onto the past), the new cultural
historians of education draw attention to “textual silences” and “blind spots”.
Such signals betray, as it were, the unconscious aspect of a text. Texts do not
refer unproblematically to what exists outside the text, but are, as has been
said, the material externalisation of structures and processes that have made
the production possible. The new cultural educational historian therefore tries
to understand how language and culture give intentionality to our deeds through
their own logic. He tries to grasp the sphere of discursive orders, symbolic
practices and media techniques that structure the involvement of the individual
in society. “Our interest is in a historical imagination in the study of
schooling that focuses on knowledge as a field of cultural practice and cultural
production. It is to historicize what previously was subservient to a
philosophical ‘unconsciousness,’ that is, the objects that stood as the
monuments that projected its moral imperatives and salvation stories. This
historicizing does not reject commitments but considers how commitments are
interned and enclosed through the making of objects of interpretation,
reflection, and possibility” (Popkewitz et al., 2001, p. 15).
Focusing on the history of
education, the linguistic turn therefore implies the re-orientation of a number
of basic assumptions of modernism, which are related to the Enlightenment
Project. First, the generalised progress thought was brought down. More
specifically, a purely linear and teleological view of history was dismissed.
In such a view, it is not only assumed that the “makeable” person and society
can become “better” through development, but that this aim is at the same time
revealed in the inherent dynamics of history. Second, the role of the subject
as actor in history is rendered greatly problematical. Rather than on the
impulses to educational innovation and improvement that would have been based
on the individual, the focus now is on the discursive space which structures
the educational field. One examined how the discursive space comes about, how
it develops, how it constructs subjects and social activities (such as
upbringing, training and education) and what forms of power and suppression are
consequently produced and organised. In this way, the new cultural history aims
to distance itself clearly from the paradigms that preceded it. Ultimately
these are, according to T. Popkewitz et al. (2001, p. 13 ff.), still rooted too
much in historicism. This historical tradition finds it difficult to live with
the thought of an absent subject in history. The philosophy of awareness of the
Enlightenment brought forth the idea of a self-aware actor, a creative and a
priori subject that could be emancipated via universal knowledge and could
consequently steer history in the direction of more humanity. Linked to the
conceptions of liberalism and the modern state (which was thought of as the
emancipation of a collective will), this provided stories of progress on the
blessings of upbringing and education and the good life of children, educators
and society. The irony of this historicism was, however, that, by positing a
supra-historical idea of progress, it wiped out history – history was, as it
were, made blind to the way in which historical conditions determined the
finality and direction of stories on history. This “irony” of historicism has
been described by W. Benjamin as the emptying of history by history.
In order to puncture the
“false” historical awareness to which historicism has given rise, use can be
made of the techniques of “deconstruction” (a concept taken from Derrida). This
means that the “track” of the linguistic “drive” that such an historical
awareness has brought forth must be exposed, or formulated differently, that
the foundations of the linguistic code that structure and construct this
exposition must be made visible. Following Foucault, it is assumed that history
of human knowledge and science comes down to the unravelling of the hidden
regime and the general policy of “truth” that is active in it. On the basis of
the awareness of this Sisyphean task, we have, in the context of educational
historiography, repeatedly argued for a demythologising perspective (Depaepe,
1997). Demythologising is – in the sense that Rorty has attributed to it – a
“cartographic” activity: mapping the field of discussion. In view of doing
this, it is far from unnecessary to consider here what have been the dominant
“paradigms” among historians of education, and to look for the “narratives”
these more or less generally accepted approaches to the educational past have
given rise.
Paradigmatic developments towards the “new
cultural history of education”
Kuhn (1979) used the term
paradigm in the sense of a model approach, a “disciplinary matrix” of coherent
entities of laws, theories, applications and instruments that belong to the
consensus of a particular group of scientists. Paradigms are pivots around
which the “revolutions” in the physical sciences turn. Kuhn emphasises in
particular in these revolutions the discontinuity with what preceded them. The
transition from one paradigm to another, he argues, ushers in a crisis state
from which a new form of “normal” science can flourish. This transition in his
view is not a cumulative process. It is more an “envelope” in which the points
of departure for the redefinition of the specialist field become visible. With
regard to writing history of education, the argument of successive paradigms to
some extent holds true, but in relation to the context of radical breaks in
which that would happen we have considerable reservation. We conceive the
development in the history of science of the discipline of history of education
far more as a continuum (see, e.g., Depaepe, 2004). This continuum presents
itself as richly chequered process of intersecting outcomes. The break lines,
to which Kuhn has alluded in the context of his analysis of the natural
sciences, are, with regard to educational historiography, principally breaks in
“self-discourse”. The aim was to demonstrate via methodological, theoretical or
historiographical reflections on research how revolutionarily different the
“new” approach was, so the category of “discontinuity” was obviously needed
more for this than was “continuity”.
It is easy on the basis of
self-discourse in an international perspective to distinguish three to four
phases in the post-war development of the history of education as a field of
research. The preference for the new cultural history of education, which
gained ground particularly during the course of the 1990s, was preceded by the
(new) social history of education. This “paradigm shift” in the direction of a
more socially or sociologically substantiated educational historiography is
said to have taken place chiefly in the 1960s and 1970s. The new social history
of education, according to the internal conceptualisation in the field,
replaced the “outdated” history of ideas of the great educational thinkers,
which is said to have taken root particularly in the 1950s, partly in the
context of teacher training. Following the 19th-century tradition, a
“canonising” encounter with one’s own past, directed towards opening up the
educationally valuable in the heritage of the history of ideas, offered a good
platform for legitimising contemporary educational action. From the point of
view of the history of the history of education, such an approach based on the
history of ideas in turn contrasted with the antiquarian and chronologically
constructed acts-and-facts history, which was often encountered in the
context of institutional educational history. Such “school history”, although
it was not devoid of the modernist belief in progress, had, all things
considered, turned out to be less functional in the context of teacher
training.
However, anyone who on the
basis of actual publications of educational history wishes to investigate the
specific evolutions and revolutions in the specialist field will soon come to
the conclusion that the development of the research reality has been far more
complex than these broad generalisations of the self-image of the discipline
suggest. To begin with, the paradigms cited here intersect far more than is
usually assumed. Social and cultural historiography on education is certainly
not an invention of the late 20th century. In the wake of German historicism, attention
was already paid to the study of the organic growth that could be established
in the relatively autonomous cultural field of education. This study naturally
had a different appearance than the present-day profiles of social and cultural
educational historiography, but this does not deny that outpourings have
continued to occur to the present to give the discipline a professional and
educationally relevant appearance. To an extent, sedimentations of previous
paradigmatic layers are still active. In addition, the heterogeneity of “new”
impulses for both social and cultural historiography on education cannot be
ignored. Far from having been a monolithic paradigm, the preference for social
educational history was (and is) borne by a sturdy methodological debate on the
role of history in theory-forming, in which diametrically opposed positions are
often adopted: from empirical source description of social ties to
education through the integration of sociological models and theories – an
anything but flat contours of schools and directions of research, which we
cannot examine in detail here owing a lack of space.
With a view to a better
understanding of contemporary educational historiography, we merely point out
that complicated sociological models are at the basis in part of what is known
as the world system analysis, which is currently much in vogue in the framework
of comparative approaches. Studies of the “neo-institutionalist school” – which
argues for a more sophisticated form of the traditional functionalism in
sociology and with which the names of J.W. Meyer, F.O. Ramirez, and J. Boli are
associated – demonstrate that the educational institutions and the education
system as such have been of decisive significance for the consolidation of the
“modern” nation state and the positioning of the individual in it. In “modern”
times, the “nation state” has gradually taken over the task of intermediate
bodies, such as classes and guilds, as well as of cosmo-politically-oriented
churches of traditional society. Education became the secularised version of
the ecclesiastical message of salvation: as an outstanding rite of initiation,
the school promised progress and deliverance for individual and nation (Caruso
& Roldán Vera, 2005). Despite
the political and social characteristics of various states, the build-up of
education for the masses in the western world followed a similar route. There
is discussion in this context of a “symptomatic isomorphism”. National and
cultural unity, to a significant degree, was acquired through the school. It
propagated and incarnated as an institution values such as the manipulability
of the individual and society, the associated belief in progress, as well as
the scientific rationality of this modernistic dream which gradually took on a
transnational, universal and universalistic appearance - certainly after the
Second World War, when the school and the associated ideology of redemption had
gained worldwide support (Schriewer, 2004). According to neo-institutionalist
thinking, the school as an institute for the masses first integrated various
population groups in dominant “nationalities”. This process took place
principally in the 19th century, although the impetus for it had clearly been
given in the 18th century (see Pereira de Sousa, et al., 2005). The core of
this process was based on the formation of the notion of “citizenship”– the
ethically constructive attitude that was expected of every individual as a
member of the society with respect to the state. The idea of citizenship gradually
developed to that of “world citizenship”- the ethical loyalty with respect to
the imaginary culture of the global community, to which people were bound as a
result of the transnational modernisation processes that were taking place.
As a result of globalisation
thinking, great social movements such as secularisation, the rise of industrial
capitalism, the intensification of international contacts through trade and
industry can be relatively easily described and understood, including for parts
of the world that do not belong to the centre of western society. But it is
obvious that the practical details of such vastly conceived paradigms can vary
widely depending on the historical contexts to which it is de facto directed.
Mutatis mutandis, the same applies to the disciplinisation thinking that
without doubt occupies the most significant place as a grand theory within the
new cultural history of education.
Narratives of civilisation, disciplinisation,
normalisation, globalisation, colonisation, educationalisation and
feminisation: traces of paradoxes of “post-modern” educational historiography?
As is well known, the
western process of civilisation is in essence traced back by Elias (1969R)
to making people ever “neater” and “tamer” by means of complex forms of social
and mental influence. Imitation of social reference groups plays a great role
in this. One imposes on oneself the pattern of others, which gives rise, as it
were, to a spiral of civilising work. As lower groupings try to take over the
more refined forms of social intercourse and the living and behaviour standards
of the upper social layers, these upper layers themselves, desiring to be
distinct, then impose on themselves even stricter behaviour control, which then
evokes an urge to imitate among these others, and so on. Insofar as the process
of civilisation is disciplinisation and/or drill, Elias's theory can easily be
linked to the normalisation thinking of Foucault, who focussed just as much on
history for the development of his ideas. Both made use of the “genealogical”
method, aimed at understanding the social changes on the basis of themselves.
Both studied long-term social processes; they examined the rules whereby these
processes are structured, what is inherited from the past, and what is
manifested as innovation. They both arrived at an internal dynamic, based on
relations of power and dominance, that is constitutive for the occurrence of a
particular (modern or western) form of society, just as much as for the
occurrence of particular types of knowledge as for the process of
subjectivisation (Varela, 2001). Foucault searched for knowledge incorporated
into the complex institutional system and arrived at the discursive practice of
power. This power permeates the whole of society and is manifestly present at
all its levels. It cannot be localised but is expressed as a chain of events in
which supervising, punishing and controlling are permanently present as a
common motif (Foucault, 2004R, p. 215). The ultimate aim of this
disciplinary strategy (which was manifested from the 16th and 17th
centuries on through the “great interment” of the poor, the mentally ill, the
prostitutes, and so on) is to “normalise” people, that is to say to transform
their bodies into obedient machines with good health, a “correct” mentality,
and an appropriate (that is to say, socially desirable) needs structure. What
is normal is ultimately determined by the production of the knowledge and
science itself, which, principally from the Enlightenment on, has come to play
an essential role as part of a more perfected technology of power. As
disciplinary exercise of power becomes invisible, the subject has come more to
the fore as the object of science. As power comes to function more anonymously,
individualisation over those on whom the power is exercised arises: each
individual is articulated as an object of science and control.
The integration of
normalisation thinking à la Foucault has without doubt enriched
educational historiography. Examples are legion, certainly in the field of
“special” education, which has made itself available as an excellent field of
application for a cultural offensive with all kinds of normalising effects –
albeit that this cultural compulsion often takes a unilaterally negative
colouring, in the sense that little attention has been paid to the emancipating
effects that this cultural compulsion could possibly have had (Dekker, 2001).
From this point of view, the question remains to what extent normalisation
thinking, despite its instructive value for the direction that
educationalisation has taken as a process, is capable of spanning the entire
set of effects relating to the promotion of personal, social and cultural
welfare. Such effects cannot be viewed in isolation from the perception of individual
people, and – insofar as educational historiography has given a definite answer
– it appears that this cannot be pushed without qualification into the
straitjacket of one or other disciplinary “master plan”.
Indeed, Foucault he himself
has not exclusively nor primarily defined disciplinisation negatively. Thus,
possibly “person-promoting” outcomes of this process certainly need not be
regarded as unintentional side-effects (whether or not thought of as resistance
from the lower classes). Like Elias, Foucault appreciated just as much the
productive aspects of the exercise of power (Varela, 2001). It is precisely
social compulsion, which through inner normalisation becomes self-compulsion
that, according to him, produces the person, the individual. Only that
individual does not exist as a being in which unity or a free will can be
detected. People are merely combinations of positions in diverging structures,
which function according to their regularities, and the ideology of the free
and creative unit subject – itself a product of discipline – entails a
limitation of human capabilities. Foucault, therefore, refused to accept in
history a kind of centre or subject from which a network of causal relations
might originate. It was not without irony that he pointed out that freedom
could not be equated with the overthrow or denial of the existing order.
Freedom was not the opposite of power or compulsion, but was, like the lack of
freedom, associated with it in a complex manner. The educational task of humanity
was therefore not “liberation” – the great dream of Enlightenment and modernity
– but “living in freedom” – a notion also expressed before him by A. Gramsci
(Boomkens, 2004). Gramsci, who wrote many of his works in prison under the
Mussolini regime, pointed out before the Second World War that the idea of
“revolution”, a single battle against a bastion of corrupted power, had been
overtaken by such things by the democratisation of politics, the increased
influence of economic power with ramifications around the world, and the
growing significance of public opinion in Europe as well as in the United
States. In highly developed, complex and sharply differentiated societies,
“the” authority and “the” power had many kinds of faces and effects. In
connection with the generalisation of public education imposed from above, for
example, Gramsci stated that this could remove the lower classes from
ignorance. The school enabled them to rise above the folklore, superstition,
fear, and magic of the traditional view of the world (Simon, 1987).
Therefore, there are
difficulties with the image of unilateral control of the individual to which,
rather than the normalisation thinking of Foucault himself, the derivations
from it – including in the educational history – have given rise. In the view
of de Certeau, what is more applicable here is the conclusion that people,
despite the existence of tenacious and compulsive structures in society, try
constantly to escape this imposed compulsion and eventually also succeed. Instead
of an ordered whole, “the” society emerges as a well-nigh ungovernable swarm of
individuals who are moved by individual emotions, insights and experiences, on
which the controlling interventions of planners, sociologists, psychologists,
educationalists, and the like, all things considered, have only modest
influence. It is difficult to think of processes such as “normalisation” and
“civilising” as linear, modernistic stories of progress. Rather than as single
and simple narratives, they point to the complexity and multiplicity of the
final result of the “civilisation” – a theme that resonates all the more
strongly in the present-day “stories of globalisation”: “For the first time in
its long linear and cumulative history, civilisation is not described just in
terms of increased transparency, increased freedom or increased diversity but
principally in terms of increased chaos, indefiniteness, ambiguity, doubt. That
this is possible – and not just possible but also fruitful – can become
apparent only if we are prepared not so much to drop the concept of
civilisation, or the whole idea of the Enlightenment or modernisation, as to
show how such processes are the result of more than one source or authority”
(Boomkens, 2004, p. 6).
The outcome of
globalisation cannot be interpreted univocally any more than the result of
disciplinisation can. Some call them “hybridisation”, “creolisation” and such
things (attention being invariably drawn to the occurrence of new differences
within globalisation that is thought of all too homogeneously); others speak of
“glocalisation”, by which is meant that globalisation at the same time also
signifies localisation and delocalisation. Civilisation does not emerge from
one centre but is the complex result of multiple influences and practices,
which, despite the general tendencies present in it, can produce differentiated
results in the short and long term. No internationalisation without
indigenisation, as J. Schriewer (2004) recently wrote. But this does not alter
the fact that the generalised dependency on the global economy, bringing in its
wake accelerated despatialisation via the Internet, “assaults” us as a fate
hardly to be averted. Just as in civilisation and normalisation processes, the
paradoxical nature of globalisation appears to consist in creating “freedom in
dependence” or perhaps better still “freedom as dependence”. In the same way
that advancing institutionalisation, structuring, and isolation of the world in
which children and young people live in the name of “emancipation” through
upbringing, training, and education appears to encourage increasing
patronisation, it is a paradoxical observation that the “liberal”, “democratic”
market society, in the name of free circulation of people and goods, is not
just increasingly regulating itself but is also ruling out any alternative for
society – which easily continues to arouse fears among “different-globalists”
and “anti-globalists” of standardisation, “coca-colonisation”, “McDonalisation”
and all manner of other ironic terms.
To the extent that such a
“progressive” heritage keeps open other paths for society, it probably also has
a historic mission. Not to harness history before the cart of its ideology, but
to demonstrate that the slogan of those, who considered it necessary to
proclaim the end of history on the basis of globalisation, ultimately holds
little water. As the Gramsci-inspired educational historian B. Simon once
remarked, history (and that of education in particular) leads to the
“liberating” insight that things have not always been the way they are now and
therefore neither do they need to remain the way they are now. Or, to put it in
the more contemporary terms of the sociologists and educationalists who, on the
basis of the world-system theory described above, propagate a symbolic “world
culture” of universal human rights: “There was nothing inevitable about Western
ascendancy nor is there any reason to believe that this is a permanent world
condition” (Ramirez, 2003, p. 10). The generalisation of education by the
systematic institutionalisation of the school may well be responsible for
homogenisation and universalisation of society in the direction of the
neo-capitalist and neo-liberal model; the isomorphic educational regime of
globalising society also lies at the basis of the broadening of the awareness
of the individual: “schooling has too many amphetamine-like effects to serve as
opiate for the masses” (Ramirez, 2003, p. 11). This once again leads to
another, albeit intriguing paradox, namely that the universalistic aspirations
(aroused by education) for finding of identity, like the need (also aroused by
education) to substantiate this rationally will perhaps lead to a
“dewesternisation” rather than a “westernisation” of world culture...
Indeed, as far as our
research on the history of education in the former Belgian Congo has indicated
(e.g. Depaepe & Van Rompaey, 1995), the study of the colonial educational
past, more even than that of the Western history in general, revealed the
systemic faults and the pedagogical paradoxes of the 'modern' educational
project. One of them certainly encompasses the discrepancy between the
educational objectives and the educational effects. The colonization of the
area, which was accompanied largely by the destruction of the existing culture,
set off educational processes in the autochthons that, in the long term, turned
out to be incompatible with the points of departure of the colonization, casu
quo, evangelization. Far from adopting the stereotypical,
leftist-revisionist coloured discourse of the missionary as the stooge of a
lobby lusting for economic gain ─ the thesis of an ambitiously orchestrated
educational plot against the blacks does not hold true as such ─ it still cannot be denied that the colonial
education did not give directly evidence of much emancipatory power. In our
opinion, there is enough evidence to argue that the Belgian civilizers,
including the missionaries, played the tutelage card for too long. It is true
that the Church in the second half of the 1950s increasingly lined up behind
the Congolese people, but the heritage of the past weighed heavily. At the time
of independence in 1960, the Congo did not have the necessary functionaries and
know-how to govern the country effectively. Instead of striving to broaden
awareness, the missionaries as well as the colonists tried as best they could
to socialize the pupils entrusted to them to become docile helpers of the
colonial system. Insofar as critical thinking was still promoted, it appeared
all in all to be little more than an undesired side effect. In any case, one
was aware ─ and this was the fundamental paradox the
educational agents saw themselves confronted with ─ that the success of the colonial adventure required
a certain introduction to “modern” (Western?) critical thought and cultural
pattern, particularly for the 'elite', but one also knew all too clearly that
too much education could lead to the destabilization of the autochthon life.
The question of 'how far can/must we go' thus hovered constantly in the
background of the quasi-exponential expansion of primary education for the
masses.
The fact that resistance
regularly arose against the all too stringent disciplining from above
illustrated, however, as did the relatively high dropout rate, that the Western
educational machine ran anything but smoothly (see also Depaepe, 1998). The
dysfunctioning of agricultural education, which was intended to halt the flight
from the land and the accompanying loss of control over the masses, constituted
perhaps the best example of this. But also the increasing dissatisfaction of
the évolués, who had been able to push through to the scarce forms of
continued and higher education, points, all in all, in the same direction.
According to the educational dream of the Belgian policy makers in the Congo,
the autochthons should be prepared for independence slowly but surely. This was
done by paternalistically preaching the development of a harmonious cooperation
model so that the Belgian interests in the area could be assured. It is true
that the African identity had to be strengthened by means of education, but the
Western civilization model continued to be directive. The internal dynamics of
the Western civilizing process produced among the autochthons a repugnance for
manual labour and caused social disintegration by emigration to the city and
the penchant for a job in governmental administration. In the countryside,
elementary education after Independence headed for catastrophe, and in the
urban centres, too, the double-tracked nature of education manifested itself
ever more painfully. In addition to an increasing group of excluded people,
education delivered an elite, who were saddled with inferiority complexes who
could give vent to their frustrations on subordinates with impunity.
Without wanting to ascribe
the bankruptcy of present education in Congo completely to a failing colonial
system, we must admit that some of the present problems go back to the Belgian educational
past. Together with the educational structures from the colonial era, the
authoritarian-hierarchical viewpoint of the whites was “appropriated” by
several Congolese leaders with little if any hesitation. Belgian education in
the Congo resembled not a successful enterprise but a runaway locomotive that,
in spite of all the good intentions, inevitably raced to its own destruction.
Probably, an interesting
parallelism is still to be discovered here (see, in this respect, Depaepe, Briffaerts, Kita Kyankenge Masandi
& Vinck, 2003) between the postcolonial “appropriation” of modern
(i.c. western, neo-liberal) educational standards in developing countries at
the one hand and the neo-liberal “transformation” of the progressive
educational heritage in the “modern” world at the other hand. In “old” Europe
as well as in “new” world of North America, the reception of “progressive”
educational thought did not occur according to a linear logic of one or another
idea-historical chain but according to the dynamic and capricious principles of
imputation and appropriation. If the leading educational philosophers and great
thinkers (see De Coster, Depaepe, Simon & Van Gorp, 2005; Popkewitz, 2005)
were read at all by educators, they projected into their writings what they
ultimately wanted to read or see or what they simply felt. The so often cheered
pedagogical reception history must, in our opinion, then at least be
complemented by a pedagogical “perception history” in which instinctive,
psychological processes such as perception, empathy – Be-eindrücking, as
is said so well in German – are considered at least as important as the
receptive rational. The romantic, theological-pastoral discourse of the
elevation of the people of God (formulated by Pestalozzi among others) was, for
example, adapted, in our opinion, not so much in function of one’s own
pedagogical, political, and social considerations and implications as in
function of its servitude to various political, pedagogical, social, and
economic agendas of the “consumers” – agendas of the moment that, possibly, can
be embraced in larger-scale modernisation processes, such as nation formation,
secularisation, pedagogisation or educationalisation, professionalisation, and
so on. Such ideologisations, rationalisations, and legitimations, which are
generally the result of historical filtering processes, transformations, and
appropriations of pedagogical concepts constitute in any event, as “working
history”, an essential component of the modern historiography of education.
They bring the story of the history of educational thought within a
culture-historical line that Michel Foucault and others have drawn by
conceiving history as a discourse about discourses (see also Depaepe 1992 &
2006).
However, the discursive
story line of pedagogical ideas does not stand alone within the “new” cultural
history of education. It is constantly brought into relation with what the
concrete pedagogical practice yields as its own exposition structures. In
contrast to what the classic history of ideas paradigm accepts in line with
philosophical idealism, the relation between “theory” and “practice”, or, if
you will, between “idea” and “action”, is conceived here not as a one-way
street from the one to the other. The historical dynamic (dialectic?) that
occurs between the two poles (sometimes conceived as a somewhat more complex
tension curve across a broad middle field of “mentalities”) is, in my opinion,
much more complex than what a simple “top-to-bottom” relation of theory and
practice would lead one to assume. As has emerged from our own research, this
dynamic must be conceived rather circularly: pedagogical practice does not
simply endure the terror of theory; it itself also transforms theory in
function of the legitimation of its own actions. What remained in the concrete
practice of the progressive-pedagogical, also within the most progressive
educational circles, was, considered from this perspective, often little more
than slogan language, separated from and even opposed to the original
intentions. In relation to the implementation of educational innovations, the
dynamic between what we have elsewhere called higher and lower pedagogy
(Depaepe et al 2000) exposes precisely one of the fundamental causes of why
pedagogical-didactic reforms proceed so slowly. Paraphrasing Larry Cuban
(1993), we can state that educational reform movements – including their
theoretical backgrounds and starting points – change not so much the school and
education themselves than, inversely, are controlled by the “grammar of
schooling” active in it.
We shall return to this
“grammar” immediately, but let us first point out that this does not, however,
alter the fact that the idea of globalisation of the educational space,
including in the Foucauldian sense, can be critically questioned at its
discursive level. It forms part of a continued liberal administrative regime in
which the social democratic ideology and strategy of the active welfare state
is no longer experienced as a problem of social inequality but as one of
inclusion and exclusion. For Popkewitz (2004), the criterion of this exclusion
forms the manufactured concept of “lifelong learner”, which at the same time
serves as the impetus for a new type of cosmopolitanism, by which the spirit is
“made” and the self is “managed”. Masschelein and Simons (2003, p. 76 ff.) see
the emergence of this new globalism as an economisation of the social. On the
one hand, it fits in which the propaganda for the usable, “managing self” and
on the other it gives the “experts” (therapists, psychologists, educationalists
etc.) the opportunity to “sell” their expertise, which in our view presupposes
educationalisation in a dual manner. However that may be, the invitation to
conceive social relations as the enterprising choice of an autonomous,
independent subject with individual motives meanwhile provides the ironic
paradox with discursive anonymity itself.
Quite apart from this
critique of the contemporary orientation of the trend towards globalisation,
with and without a cultural history colouring, there is obviously also the
question to what extent the story of globalisation in itself offers an adequate
impetus for the construction of educational historiography. With regard to the
neo-institutionalist research tradition, in any event, this large-scale
approach risks surveying educational development too hastily, too superficially
and too linearly (Caruso & Roldán Vera, 2005). In addition, there is a
danger that this “school” of research, which situates the educational “isomorphism”
of globalisation principally at the macro- and meso-level of educational action
(Schriewer 2004) also merely gazes at those levels (de Sousa et al, 2005),
while the quasi-uniform patterns of action at the micro-level have presumably
worked just as strongly in a “homogenising” and “globalising” way. The latter
meanwhile appears to be the outcome of studies on the grammar of schooling,
first undertaken by American educational historians like L. Cuban, D. Tyack and
W. Tobin (Cuban, 1993²). The archetype of this grammar of schooling can be
easily found in museums of “education”, all over the world. That these
education museums breathe the same spirit almost everywhere proves how
universal the “text” of this school grammar is – even though the social and
cultural “context” over the various periods has brought with it important
differences of nuance. And it proves just as much how deeply the grammar of the
school is interwoven with the process of modernisation, globalisation and
educationalisation. In various languages and against the background of
different cultures, the same “educational regime” became established almost
everywhere in the “civilised” world: a similar complex of actions with the aim
of training the students (for later) by disciplining them. This is evidenced
not just by the educational behaviour and how children are dealt with
didactically but also by the determinants of the school culture.
School culture, which to a
great degree structures the content and outlook of the disciplinary
“educational regime”, was studied in particular by the French school of
history, educational and otherwise. School culture can be defined in this
tradition as the entire set of norms that determines the directions of
education and determines the practices to obtain the desired knowledge contents
and social behaviour from the students (Nóvoa, 2001). Significant research in
this connection is also being done in the Spanish-speaking world. Educational
historians are searching for what is known as the Arqueología de la escuela
(Viñao, 2001). The “archaeology” of teaching and the associated rituals of
school life cannot be seen, however, in isolation from the “educational”
significance of running a school. It is only on the basis of the “basic
semantics” of educational theory (e.g. Oelkers, 1991) that the American concept
of grammar of schooling can be fully interpreted. In our view, the “grammar of
educationalisation” (or “educationalising”) is therefore an unavoidable
complement to the “grammar of schooling” (Depaepe et al., 2000).
The polarity between
schooling and educationalising, alongside the irony of educational innovation,
reveals the more fundamental educational paradox from which the process of
educationalisation can best be interpreted. Better education, according to the
“enlightened” ideal of the late 18th century, was to result in more mature
people, but this did not prevent this “emancipative” objective invariably
presupposing an asymmetric educational relationship as a means. Training was
dependent on the subjection and obedience of apprentices to the authority of
the “master”. The latter was in charge of an educational adventure that
increasingly made use of a specified curriculum. He knew the path that had to
be followed and the techniques that could be employed for this purpose. The
proclaimed ideal of self-development could be founded on unbridled freedom as
little as it could on blind obedience. The school, as the prediction and at the
same time reduction of real life, required a compromise between freedom and
bondage. Children had to be able to develop under the invisible – as far as
possible because the ideal of punitive sobriety applied with regard to
punishment – yet firm hand of the leader. More pedagogy and pedagogics,
therefore, did not necessarily result in more autonomy for the child but could,
conversely, also culminate in prolonged dependence (infantilisation). It was
essential to this, however, that the brutalising elements of physical violence
through the “sweet smile” and a “forced atmosphere of harmony and contentment”
were “professionally” altered to mental threats and emotional blackmail.
Such educational flair came
ever close to the vicinity of the ideal, considered to be female, of
gentleness, which in turn touches on another educational paradox, that of
“feminisation” versus “feminism”– a movement that as such aims for emancipation
of women (and not stereotyping of women in function of one or another
occupational group). Our hypothesis is that it is difficult to view the
feminisation of the teaching profession in isolation from the
professionalisation of the sector. Women are, as it were, trained in
sensitivity for the educational outlook. The educationally correct “outlook” as
it were became the trademark of the purported “femininity” of women and
consequently legitimised the traditional division of roles between men and
women (hard sector versus soft sector). Hence, as the influence of education
increased, the feminisation of the teaching profession and of training also
increased – a phenomenon not even brought to a halt by the undeniable
“emancipation of women” in recent decades. It is notable, however, that this
paradox until now has received little attention in the feminist-inspired
historical writing on education. This historiography, nevertheless, has brought
about significant adjustments in the usually “male short-sightedness” of
traditional educational historiography (cf. Lowe, 2000). J. Herbst (1999) even
welcomed it as the most significant innovation in a field in which he otherwise
saw little evolution since the heyday of American revisionism in the 1970s: one
more reason to see, in the unravelling of the subtle paradoxes to which the
process narratives of disciplinisation, normalisation, globalisation,
educationalisation, feminisation and so on have given rise, one of the great
challenges of “contemporary” educational historiography. By way of conclusion,
therefore, the question arises of the extent to which the study of these
paradoxes is compatible with the conceptualisation of the new cultural history
of education. In other words:
Is this truly “new cultural” educational
historiography?
Ultimately, the answer to
this probably adds little. To the extent that the educational paradoxes relate
to the epistemological condition of perspectivism (with which people as
cultural and biological beings necessary look at the past), they are also
applicable to the labels people have wanted to attach to the history of
education. As C. Barros (2004), among others, has noted with respect to the methodological
debate in general history writing, it is mostly a matter of overcoming the
dichotomies prompted by characterisations as “old” and “new” by striving for
new syntheses through a mixing of historical genres and lines of research. And
this has consequences not only for the theoretical positioning in the
historiographical debate but also for of the concrete research “design” (the
elaboration of research questions, the selection of source materials, the
collection of data, the construction of the text as the “result” of the
research, and so on). The study of educational paradoxes does not in any way
exclude a fuite en arrière (although the great return to the traditional
empirical and/or “modern” social history, referred to by Barros, 2004, as the positivist
turn, in our view must be radicalised and made absolute as little as the linguistic
turn, which is said to have ushered in post-modernism). In the context of
feminisation research, for example, a rigid statistical substructure – a kind
of quantitative prosopography – is a conditio sine qua non that must
precede any new-fashioned interpretation. Figures are, therefore, by no means a
bad thing; on the contrary, they can help to prick “educational” myths.
What is needed, all
things considered, is a “mix” of approaches, of “ways of seeing” – a plurality
of insights. As a result of being able to change perspective, we become better
armed to deal with the heterogeneity of linguistic games and expositions from
the educational past – as well as with the ensuing irony. Educational life,
like political life (see Ankersmit, 1990, who points out that the serious,
radical French revolutionaries who strove for a society free of injustice and
brute force achieved the precise opposite – a society in which anyone suspected
could end up on the guillotine) is not intrinsically ironic, but it only
becomes so through historical insight. This irony takes place through the
realisation that the results of education and training can differ dramatically
from what the educational activity had initially intended, just as the outcomes
of politics can differ greatly from the objectives on which it is based. In
this sense, we plead with Barros et al. (2004, p. 43) neither for purely
objectivistic historiography in the manner of von Ranke nor for the purely
subjectivist approach of post-modernism: “We
propose a Science with a human subject that discovers the past as people
construct it” – which at
the same time contains an awareness of one’s own relativity (and the associated
modesty). Indeed, if we are not able to appreciate the relativity of the
categories we use, we run the danger of not gaining anything and of losing
everything...
References and/or complementary bibliography
Ankersmit, F.R. (1990). De
navel van de geschiedenis. Over interpretatie, representatie en historische
realiteit. Groningen: Historische Uitgeverij.
Ankersmit, F.R. (1996). De
spiegel van het verleden. Exploraties I: geschiedtheorie. Kampen/Kapellen:
Kok Agora/Pelckmans.
Barros, C. & .McCranck,
L.J. (eds.), History Under Debate. International Reflection on the
Discipline. New York, etc.: The Haworth Press.
Boomkens, R. (red.) (1992).
De asceet, de tolk en de verteller. Richard Rorty en het denken van het Westen.
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Keep the heaps
together!
Diversity,
citizenship and education: St. Martin as a Caribbean immigration metropolis,
lessons from Amsterdam and vice versa
Open University
of the Netherlands, the
Netherlands
iwan@sewandono.com
1. Introduction: a conceptual framework
In this paper I develop a
conceptual framework for integrated debate and deliberation on policymaking
that goes beyond economic bipartitions and controversies between state and
market, demand and supply, or individualism and collectivism. For effective
policymaking these antagonist approaches produce mainly sterile and fruitless
visions.
I was triggered directly by
one of the proposed themes for this conference: diversity, citizenship and
education. My work includes advising the Amsterdam government on diversity and
integration. Some reflections lead me to perspectives and theses that I shall
elaborate on in this lecture.
Of course the scale of government
in Amsterdam and St. Martin is different. This will not be an academic exercise
in making a comparison between apples and pears. I shall stick to issues and
questions relevant to policy. The lessons we produce maybe more about omissions
(what is not done) than about existing policy (what do we do). I claim that
both governments have some important traits in common and can probably learn
from each others experiences.
Like St. Martin, Amsterdam
is a global metropolis to which people from other areas migrate. Metropolis
refers to a geographic centre that attracts people from more peripheral
regions. This results in an immigration surplus. In Amsterdam, the last
decades, new migrants originate mainly from Morocco, Turkey, Surinam, and the
Dutch Antilles. Together, they constitute the greater part of youth, which
means that the demographic future of Amsterdam is coloured and diverse.
Effective and inclusive policymaking for all Amsterdam people, with or without
a personal history in the city, can be considered as the hardcore of good
governance in the Dutch capital.
This is far from easy; the
citizens experience a great many discomforting events again and again,
especially regarding safety. Not everybody feels safe in the Amsterdam
metropolis. Therefore, the Mayor of Amsterdam, Job Cohen, made this his
personal and administrative mission: No matter how difficult, we are keeping
the heaps together!
In St. Martin, the
demographic situation is not fully clear. Figures are non-existing or
unreliable. Essentially, here we meet three broad groups: 1) people born on the
island, 2) people who came from overseas and have a formal status on the
island, and 3) migrants without formal status and therefore nearly invisible
for the government. As a result, members of the third demographic group stay
outside the direct reach of medical care, education, and security. As a matter
of fact, these undocumented inhabitants have no full human rights. Even rough
estimations of their number are hard to get. It appears very much a political
question. I noticed that those who are actually working with undocumented
migrants tend to give much higher rates than those who prefer to ignore them.
The percentages which I have heard range from 10 to 30, which makes quite a
difference!
It appears to me that
neither of the island’s governments [i.e. the French and Dutch Antillean] can
allow itself the luxury to leave immigrants, with or without formal status,
outside the reach of their policy making.
This group may not be
ignored, not only for the sake of human rights, but also for the future
economic growth of the island. These people are part of the workforce, and you
may need them badly when economy booms. Also for the sake of security and
safety since this part of the Caribbean has a great strategic importance.
The foregoing
considerations bring me to three theses that have relevance for this conference
and will be supported in the following reasoning, concerning both St. Martin
and Amsterdam:
-
Diversity is a fact and
-
Citizenship is a challenge.
-
In policymaking on greater issues, education on itself is an insufficient
solitary tool and needs to be supported with well directed flanking approaches.
2. Diversity: a fact
The concept of diversity
refers to the existence within a metropolis of a variety of ethnical and
cultural backgrounds among the inhabitants. There are two possible visions: one
in terms of vicious circles and another in terms of positive circles.
In terms of negative or
vicious circles, diversity is an exclusive concept. The
characteristics of a negative view on diversity are threefold and,
unfortunately, ubiquitous. First, there exists a great and inconsolable grief
that traditional bonds between integrated groups (in-groups) are
breaking up, which results in the crumbling of the social texture. Many people
do no longer participate in the Civil Society. Secondly, there is a great deal
of sad complaining about the steadily growing segmentation in
society. The existing social groups do not fit together anymore: they become
inward-looking, turn their backs on each other, and hold on to their own
disconnected lifestyles.
Thirdly, there is fear of
unbridled growth (proliferation) of intractable new out-groups.
They might create new lifestyles, unknown so far, outside the existing order.
They may also have an inclination to alien and unsocial values and norms.
Therefore, they are considered as a threat for the political, economic, and
social system as a whole.
This easily leads to
foolish governance —with politics like raising war on terror and other
intangible evils. That means mopping the floor while the tap is left open. It
would be much wiser to direct policy towards the causes of the problems than to
their outward symptoms. I do not reject a strong security policy by any means,
but good governance requires that this be flanked and supported by more
structural policy approaches —right into the heart and causes of the problems!
Contrary to this negative
vision, there is an inclusive view. This is embedded in positive
circles. Its characteristics are twofold. Firstly, a positive and inclusive
policy considers diversity as a broad base for new innovative creativity and
inspiration in society. Secondly, an inclusive view is directed to the
formation of new social capital. Later in this paper, I shall go such an
inclusive view based on positive circles in more detail.
3. Citizenship: a challenge
I would now like to change
the subject to citizenship. Citizenship refers to the political and structural
integration within the framework of the nation state. Citizens take a crucial
position in a democratic nation state. They certainly do belong. They count.
And they live up to their rights and obligations. They are the integrative
power base of the nation state, the basic social bond.
Citizenship does not come
into existence by decree. All of you are citizens of St. Martin by next Monday!
That does not work! Citizenship must first be generated. Where it already
exists, it must be herded, watched and guarded carefully since it is a great
good for society. Let me be very clear: the formation of citizenship is a basic
assignment for government or, even more, a challenge.
The shrinking of
citizenship is commonly seen as an intractable problem for the
administration. However, for the sake of good governance it would be an
agonizing idea that people in diversified societies like Amsterdam and St.
Martin no longer are interconnected. Three intangible developments are now
challenging government in Amsterdam and may also do so in St. Martin.
First, there is the notion
that some well-established voluntary associations and other traditional bonds
in the civil society which legitimate and back the nation states are breaking
down. The research presented in Robert Putnam’s book entitled “Bowling alone”
is a good foundation for this challenge. Secondly, many leading politicians
fear that new emerging out-groups are easily mobilized by political one-issue
parties that disintegrate the traditional concept of parliamentary democracy.
Thirdly, good citizenship implies rights and obligations. But who is going to
take civic responsibilities in a consumer society of calculating citizens who
consider themselves only as clients of the government?
My view on the concept of
citizenship fits in with my vision of diversity: for the sake of good
governance, I prefer to consider citizenship as a resource for
future-oriented policymaking. Therefore, I coin two approaches at the same
time. First, focus on newly emerging citizen initiatives. Secondly, scout,
recognize, support and facilitate these new citizen initiatives and provide
them with empowerment by all means.
In St. Martin, the design
of a new constitutional structure provides a window of opportunity for explicit
new roles of the civil servants in strengthening citizenship. The challenge
will be not to start this top down, in the sense that the department designs
the goals, targets, and approaches for an integrated cultural policy. It will
be more feasible to scout new hallmarks and stepping-stones for strengthening
the civic culture of the island. This requires participatory methods in
policymaking that must be learnt and trained. New interactive forms of
governance may be learnt and carried out. Civil servants need to learn to
listen and watch, to recognize and respect what citizens already do and what
they can do.
4. Education needs flanking approaches
It is not my aim to produce
here an academic exercise on education. I shall stick to my profession as a
scholar of policymaking. Moreover, education is only partly a goal in itself. I
see education as an indispensable vehicle for reaching goals and targets in
general policymaking on important societal questions.
However, in practice, both
in Amsterdam and St. Martin, education is too much of an autonomous field of
policymaking. I see education as a complex but solitary tool, steered and
managed by politicians, civil servants, and school boards who act autonomously,
with few regards to other policy fields like economics, fine arts, health, and
security/safety. This relative independence of the activities in education
easily leads to a sterile policy that can never reach societal goals on its own
and for its own sake. Education therefore must keep track with the great
challenges of our time.
Scholars of education in
the Caribbean, please follow our economists in their call for a stronger
workforce in the young generation, both at high and lower levels. And, follow
me in my urgent call to strengthen the social bond in St. Martin. As lecturer
in Public Administration on the island, I try to contribute to the professional
strengthening of a few leading officials in your civil service. We work on
extending their expertise and sharpening their feeling for ethics, and we
tickle their professional attitudes. You will need very good bureaucrats to
challenge your politicians. Meek civil servants make weak politicians. And that
goes at the cost of good citizenship.
We also need civil servants
with adequate education in lower brackets of bureaucracy. Examples are reliable
policemen in the streets, friendly servicemen behind the public office
counters, and capable garbage collectors, as well as welcoming and hospitable
personnel in the hotels.
Do realize that education
must also provide skilled labourers for the near future. Think about
bricklaying, roof thatching, bench fitting. And who will drive buses and do our
bookkeeping?
We must distinguish between
education in the sense of schooling and education in the sense of upbringing at
home. About the lifestyles at home: Who sets examples as a significant role
model for children, who stimulates and supports children in fatherless
families, and who prepares healthy family meals? However important family life
and the upbringing at home may be, I shall focus on the politics of schooling.
A challenge for education
both in Amsterdam and St. Martin is that too many people have an insufficient
education and do not fully develop their talents. This becomes a
trans-generational problem as it often will be transferred from mother to
daughter. This results in unfavourable effects on the economy, workforce,
security/safety, and on the citizenship in our societies. That is too bad for
these youngsters themselves, and also for Amsterdam that needs skilled youth
for the workforce, and for St. Martin suffering a great lack of skilled
labourers for the booming building projects all over the island. One observes
clearly a considerable drain of skilled labourers from one Caribbean island to
another. Is this a temporary phenomenon or are they really migrating with or
without their families?
Three facts about the
position of the Amsterdam youth:
-
The greater part of Amsterdam youth has its family roots in Morocco, Turkey,
Surinam, the Dutch Antilles and Aruba.
-
Most migrant youth live in ghetto-like city parts of Amsterdam New-West and
South-East. In many cases, they hardly ever leave their neighbourhood; they do
not even know other parts of their city!
-
Most young migrants attend the lowest level of education, which unfortunately
does not prepare people for the minimal job qualifications needed in Dutch
society.
The debate on education
appears to have lost track! There is so much debate on structural, organizational,
and specialized educational issues, as seen in the educational practice of the
last decades, that the origins of the discussions on education are blurred or
even out of sight. I select two prominent themes from a stance on diversity,
citizenship, and survival of the metropolis:
- How to promote ethnic desegregation
through education?
- How to give apt attention for the
formation of a basic skills qualification at the lowest level of
education?
I shall leave the formation
of basic skills to economists and others.[1] I shall finish this lecture by throwing some
light on a few issues in policymaking that may have a constructive meaning in
the field of education in St. Martin. The first issue concerns how education
may serve the metropolis as a centre and breeding ground for creativity and
creative industries. The second refers to the contribution of education to the
formation of social capital. Finally, I shall treat the shortcomings of an
exclusive and one-line historical view on creolization as cultural matrix for
education on St. Martin.
5. The metropolis as centre and breeding ground
for creativity: an issue in education
How important is culture,
especially how important are fine arts for the social bond in the metropolis?
Let me start with but a few observations.
In the eight wars that in
the nineties destroyed the Yugoslavian state, the Serbs deliberately destroyed
the cultural heritage of Croats, Albanians, and Kosovars. Why? What was the
deeper meaning of this targeting the cultural heritage? Why was the
centuries-old heart of the Croat city of Dubrovnik destroyed by the Serbs?
In Afghanistan, the
Taliban-regime destroyed centuries-old Buddha sculptures. Why?
The famous Buddhist temple
Borobudur near Yogyakarta on Java, in Indonesia, is one of the seven world
wonders. It has been target of a few Muslim onslaughts. Why does the Indonesian
government keep this secret? What would happen if this had been made public?
The old country Sri Lanka is governed by Buddhist Singhalese, who are
challenged by the Hindu Tamil Tigers. The story goes that government keeps
secret that the oldest findings of archaeologists are no Buddhist artefacts,
but Hindu temples. Why keep that secret?
Why all this destruction of
historical artefacts and why keeping it a secret? The answer is that culture
and local and regional fine arts probably have great meaning for policymaking
in international metropolises. They are effective vehicles for social binding,
for connecting, even for bridging contrasts and controversies among the
citizens.
I shall not defend blind
chauvinism. But a mild form of metropolitan chauvinism provides a strong
binding factor. Identification with one’s own metropolis appears to be even
stronger than with one’s country as a whole. In Amsterdam, this counts for the
older inhabitants as well as for the newer citizens. During World War II, white
labourers in Amsterdam went on strike against the German occupation under the
slogan: The bloody Germans must keep their bloody hands off our bloody own
Jews.[2] As long as the enemy is situated outside, they
feel as one. Amsterdam will always back the football club Ajax.
In St. Martin, a still
unpublished discussion paper on culture policy reads:
“A cultural policy is the
catalyst of creativity and the means to preserve the national heritage, which
consists of both the tangible and intangible heritage. A cultural policy must
create conditions, conducive to the production and dissemination of diversified
cultural goods and services through cultural industries, organizations,
institutions and individuals that have the means to assert themselves at the
local and global level.”
These are complicated
formulations. I agree with the committee concerned only if they implement this
stance in such a way that the culture policy on the island will not impede
further development of folk culture and both lowbrow and highbrow expressions
of any artistic value. Production and consumption of culture and artefacts take
place in practice, far from any government intervention. There can be no direct
governance lead in culture politics. Culture policy should work with the energy
of the grassroots and the professional arts alike. Here the task of civil
servants is to scout, recognize and facilitate authentic cultural expressions
from grassroots breeding grounds to elite levels.
How important is a generous
culture policy for a metropolis? To set an example, Amsterdam considers itself
an important international marketplace for creative services, museums,
orchestras, entertainment, ICT, and New Multi Media arts. More than 25 percent
of all creative jobs in the country are situated in Amsterdam City, where this
makes for about 7 percents of all worksites. If we also reckon the much greater
volume of directly connected worksites in the fields of hospitality, transport,
commercial services, etc., we may even come to 20 percent! The international
melting pot of young high tech professionals makes the city very lively and
attractive for other knowledge professionals. Their free and open lifestyle is
an important economic asset for Amsterdam.
The city government
develops an ambitious so-called Program Creative Industry 2007-2010.
This aims at bringing together people, ideas, and money for realizing a series
of concrete projects: the connection of education and creative industry, making
use of the cultural diversity (e.g. the hip hop scene), stimulation and
empowerment of creative entrepreneurs, enhancing joint enterprises where culture
media and ICT meet, recognizing and supporting existing and newly emerging
accommodations for creative industry, and the promotion of Amsterdam as
breeding ground and marketplace for joint creative industries.
A second campaign of the
city government is Amsterdam Topstad [Top City]. The new city government
sees great opportunities for Amsterdam as internationally attractive centre for
the development of new creative industries and invests 70 million Euros in
extremely ambitious new plans, concepts, and ideas. These activities keep pace
with a few private campaigns started by employers’ organizations aiming at a
deliberate Human Relations policy targeting young migrants.
Culture politics of
mobilization and vitalization may become a success formula for any metropolis
as international centre and breeding ground for creativity. I raise the
question: what can education contribute with here?
6. Social capital, an issue in education
Recently serious warnings
were presented to the city government of Amsterdam. The film director and
publicist Theo van Gogh, icon of absolute freedom of public speech, was
brutally murdered by a frustrated radical Islamist in Amsterdam. In the banlieue
of Paris young migrants without prospects for the future took over the nightly
power in the streets.
Researchers collected
appalling figures about the lack of communication between different ethnic
groups in the city.[3] Not only the inter group are interactions
feeble, the reciprocal images are also negative. Only some weeks ago Amsterdam
citizens of Moroccan and Surinamese origin engaged in a street fight after some
tragic murder incident resulted from a conflict about a parking lot.
This became the upbeat for
a continuous campaign to strengthen the reciprocal trust among the various
ethnic and cultural groups in the metropolis. This triggered, as said before,
the Mayor of Amsterdam for his mission statement: Keep the heaps together.
The city government now
seeks both categorical and integrative solutions for migrant groups of
youngsters, women, the elderly, those who are in and out of work, etc.
In the formation of social
capital, the city government sees substantial communication in co-productions
as a possibly effective way to break through negative conflict dynamics. But
before they participate in public affairs, even for their own sake, people must
feel safe, trusted, and respected in their own circles. The establishment or
revitalization of social bonds inside groups may be primary conditions for the
establishment of social bonds outside these groups. This refers especially to
groups that differ ethnically and culturally.
Various initiatives,
activities, and neighbourhood campaigns have been started and endorsed by the
city government of Amsterdam. It is now policy to strengthen the identification
of young migrants with the city of Amsterdam and to stimulate them in following
the behaviour of the few young migrants who play significant roles in Amsterdam
and Dutch society. We find these role models in football, entertainment and in
professional life.
One step further is that
the city district governments (since sixteen years government in Amsterdam has
been decentralized) enable and stimulate co-production as a supreme act in
citizens’ initiatives. This demands the development and apt implementation of
adequate strategies for empowerment. That means scouting, recognition,
facilitation, and support for initiatives and activities that rise and develop
bottom up.
Now, co-production means
long time cooperation. A Dutch saying goes that bureaucratic mills work slowly.
Co-production with mobilized and activated groups in society may work even more
slowly! But there is no quick fix for empowerment either. Fortunately
there are plenty of opportunities in Amsterdam. For a few years I researched
the citizens’ self-organizations in Amsterdam-West and New-West. Especially
around the big scale renovation projects, there are new opportunities and a
widely felt sense of urgency among people of different classes and origins.
Here we find already organized clusters of people who have a record of
cooperation and reciprocal trust (be it often experienced in cooperation
against the government!). The question arises again: What can education
contribute with to the formation of social capital?
7. Creolization as social bond
What is the cultural matrix
for education in St. Martin? Colleagues I met in visits to the Caribbean for
teaching and conferences have widely differing backgrounds. Students in my
Master course on the island are well informed high ranking civil servants of
various departments. Their first hand information is valuable.
There apparently exists an
overt feeling of insecurity about the cultural identity which provides the core
of the social bond on the island. Recognizing ones weaknesses is an honourable
intellectual act and stepping-stone for strengthening every development.
In St. Martin, one cannot
avoid the concept of creolization or the creolization-process, a matter of both
the development of language and culture. It strikes me that creolization on the
island (the Simaartn language and culture), as explained to me, is
essentially based on the English language and culture, enriched with a great
many other influences.
The concept is rather
exclusive and local. French-based and Spanish-based creolization on the island
are commonly considered as different processes, developing on their own and
disconnectedly. Dutch cultural influences on creolization usually tend to be
marginalized in debates on everyday life and behaviour on the island. Even to
such a degree that Dutch orientations and practices have become nearly neutral
external standards that St. Martiners now can use at free will (!) as technical
resources in strengthening their organizational and institutional life. This
paradox contains a smart pragmatic use of old colonial capital.
How sustainable is
creolization as a cultural orientation for St. Martin as East-Caribbean
metropolis? Anyway, this does not do justice to the many French- and Spanish-speaking
St. Martiners (from Haiti, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic) who soon may
outnumber those who commit themselves to the English-based creolization
process. Not to forget the fast growing numbers of residents of Indian,
Chinese, and Lebanese/Syrian origin. People from these groups are here to stay!
Before they engage in integrative activities and interaction, they need
recognition and a sense of security.
8. Quo vadis St. Martin?
Reasoning from a
geo-political angle, it may be expected that Cuba soon will become the main
metropolis and St. Martin the secondary metropolis in the North-East Caribbean.
When Cuba really opens up, within a few years, St. Martiners who do not speak
Spanish will be considered as illiterate on their own island.
Fortunately, Caribbean
people have a flair for spoken languages. And, apparently, among St. Martin
intellectuals there is a high level of poetic literacy, and their commitment to
the written language of their choice is great. So, individually, St. Martiners
may cope very well. One may, however, fear the effects of exclusive, parochial,
and backward looking orientations in processes of creolization, especially if
they guide politics on the lower levels of education.
This parallels my concern
in the foregoing paragraphs dealing with exclusiveness of the political and
administrative practices on the island. An open, inclusive, and inviting
culture provides the best means for sustainable development of St. Martin as a
metropolis. Favourable conditions for peaceful and prosperous future
development of St. Martin as a Caribbean metropolis may be found in a
combination of a careful and realistic interpretation of the island culture,
full acceptance of existing broad-based diversity, a deliberate policy on
citizenship (also for the numerous undocumented inhabitants), and the formation
of social capital by educational policy. Now, education is at stake.
Pedagogy, identity, and
politics
Educating in an identity (ethnic) crisis context:
A study of the French West Indies case
University of
Martinique, French West
Indies
max.belaise@martinique.univ-ag.fr
Introduction
The French islands of Guadeloupe
and Martinique bear some specificities that single them out in the Caribbean
Sea region. First of all, because of their specific political status, they are
full members of the European Union and constitute what is usually called the
“tropical Europe”. For many observers, such as political analyst Fred Reno[4], a research professor from the Université
des Antilles—Guyane, this adhesion is more motivated by economical
interests more than cultural ones.
In such a peculiar context,
one could wonder what education means in the Francophone Caribbean. This paper
will not deal with -but just mention- the Haitian case because it would imply
another philosophical approach. The case of the French Overseas Departments
(the official denomination for Guadeloupe and Martinique) needs a real debate.
Indeed, these territories share a common history with the languages of the
other islands: they derive from the plantation society, yet they have to cope
with deep dilemmas, such as the European concept of assimilation or the search
for a specific identity. Different concepts have been expressed: the “négritude”
(Negritude) of Aimé Césaire, Edouard Glissant’s notion of “antillanité”
(Caribbeanness), and the concept of “creolité” (Creoleness) as developed
by Raphaël Confiant, Patrick Chamoiseau and Jean Bernabé.
For the French West
Indians, what does it mean to be educated in a context that runs the risk of
dispossessing them of their personality? According to François Flahault, a
French philosopher, Europeans are “convinced that they hold the universal
message”[5]. How to protest in front of the European
epistemological posture that posits that: “we hold the universal message, but
the others do not”.
In his essay Black Skin,
White Masks, Frantz Fanon[6] wondered if the “school inspectors and the
headmasters are aware of their role in the colonies. During twenty years, with
their school programs, they endeavour to turn the Negro into a White man. At
the end, they release him and then say: you have for sure a dependence complex
towards the White man”.
Is Fanon’s paradigm “out of
date”? Was his way of thinking too revolutionary? This paper will show that
Fanon’s thought is still topical. For instance, Edouard Glissant assimilates
pedagogy to demagogy. For him, the system is perverted: it does not meet
the needs of the Martinican people.
Many analysts share this
point of view. Yet the situation is not easy because, as Césaire said in a
recent interview: “We [the Martinican people] are complex people, we are this
and yet we also that. What matters is not to cut ourselves off from ourselves.”[7]
In the educational field we
find the same complexity. According to Jean-Marie Theodore, a research worker
in education sciences: “Il faut admettre que pendant que les intellectuels et
les idéologues contestaient la domination coloniale par divers moyens, ils
continuaient à perpétuer en reproduisant de manière mimétique son
enseignement.”[8]
So, how to educate in such
a context? How to promote men and women if we can define an appropriate
philosophy of education which could reconcile all the different options in
these islands, and how to allow them to be really in tune with their immediate
environment? What is to educate in a Creole world and/or a global world?
One can assume that the
fundamental cause is the acculturation of the education in a context of
identity crisis. By the same token, it may be said that an ontological collapse
is the main cause of crisis of education. Furthermore, how to deal with the
political centralism of France?
Our aim in this paper is
first to elaborate on the contradictions present in reality, trying to show how
a real philosophical thought based on the Socratic posture: “Know yourself”
will be a way to cope with those difficulties. Our second step will be to
debate what an authentic identity as result of a correct education would
entail. At a third moment, before concluding, we shall focus on the fanonian
man, the one he dreamed for our area and whose emergence would result from
authentic education.
1. The political context and the paradoxical
education endeavour
Ever since the French
revolution, since 1788, French people are convinced of one thing: their culture
is a universal one. So, seen from this principle, it appears as normal to
civilize others, if necessary by imposing “civilization” on them. Such a
universal culture was adopted by those who were colonized as they gave up their
own.
In the West Indies, the
African slaves experienced such postulate by alienating themselves, which means
that they had to renounce their habits, their gods, their traditional way of
education. Little by little a strange idea inhabited their consciousnesses: to
look like the masters and to acquire their culture—the sovereign one because of
its universality. In a word, this is the Caliban complex about which many
Caribbean philosophers have spoken—the Antiguan Henry Paget, the Martinican
Aimé Césaire, etc.
Today things have not
changed for those two actors in the Caribbean. The French continue to believe
in the superiority of their culture. The descendants of the African slaves,
most of them, are aspiring to this open sesame for a place in this world. This
is the reality that one can appreciate. However, what is the matter with it?
The French consideration of
its universal culture is contested today by many native research workers;
furthermore, some important anthropological works confirm that no one culture
is more important than another. Nevertheless, such feeling is today insidious
in the French national education system. It has been revealed recently by the
arrivals of millions of migrants in Voltaire’s country and by riots in the
suburbs of the main towns. Following those events, sociologists, historians,
and other scientists have examined the problem. According to them, the problem
depends on this atavistic character that the rejection of any multiculturalism
hides. Thus, in his analysis, Alain Touraine, a French sociologist considers
that: “Le républicanisme français s’identifie à l’universalisme, ce qui
entraîne le plus souvent le rejet ou l’infériorisation de ceux qui sont
‘différents’. Ces obstacles à l’intégration ont des causes profondes […] Nous
sommes marqués par une tradition coloniale.”[9]
The researcher is virulent
concerning such a posture: it cannot survive any longer—which he intends when
he declares: “Il n’est plus acceptable de penser et d’agir comme si la
France était le dépositaire des valeurs universelles, et avait le droit de, au
nom de cette mission, de traiter comme inférieures ceux qui ne correspondent
pas à ce moi idéal. La fausse conscience des Français quand ils parlent
d’eux-mêmes explique la faible ouverture aux sciences sociales.”[10]
This strong criticism is
becoming more and more common among the intellectuals and the scientists of education
because of a rainbow pupil and student population, because education has an
important role: to break away from the wrong idea that “School has to transmit
a universal and complete education.” For Esther Benbassa[11], this purpose which the mathematician and
philosopher Condorcet assigned to the school institution during the century of
the Enlightenment is no longer adequate.
In fact, what is defended
is a new purpose for what is called the republican school. However, what
does this concept mean? One hears the pleas for a school whose aim is no longer
to deliver ethnocentric teachings. In other words and in terms of the present,
it should be a school which crystallizes the new rainbow configuration of the
nation and the fact of multiculturalism, instead of considering this reality as
a threat.
However, the enlightenment weltanschauung,
or worldview, did not and does still not leave any room for the overseas
cultures. The Caribbean islands which belong to France must forget their
culture to adopt the French one. About such an assimilation, a politician from
Guadeloupe has stated: “La République accepte une décentralisation technique.
Vous allez gérer les routes, le tourisme, la formation, l’artisanat et que
sais-je encore! Mais vous ne gérer pas le symbolique. Vous ne gérez pas la
langue, la culture, votre âme, votre avenir.”[12]
Really is it possible to
live such alienation by assimilation without damaging the essence of the West
Indian communities? The question is not easy to answer. But we must remember
Césaire’s appreciation: we are complex people; a way to say we do not
know what we want and we are divided ontologically. The foundation of this
argument is that historically in the two French departments in Caribbean, only
one thing motivates people: to get the same rights as all other French citizen.
As Césaire gives us to understand, the political leaders had no choice: it was
no time to philosophize[13].
Today, many political
tendencies are noticeable among the people: the autonomist, the independentist,
the departmentalist. To the latter belong those who do not want any new
political status except the status of French department.
We may not forget Fanon’s
dialectics concerning those who are victim of what he called the lactification.
Complex. According to him, “The Martinican is a French-man, he wants to
remain part of the French, he asks one thing, he wants the idiots and the
exploiters to give him a chance to live like a human being.”[14]
This will implies a
counterpart, so the price of such (material) welfare is an abandonment of one’s
identity, a master element in the educational endeavour. Furthermore, all the
benefits of the anthropological philosophy of education are left unconsidered.
2. Identity phenomenology due to an authentic
educative act
The main negative
consequence of assimilation is the lack of development of
one’s identity. There are several arguments in support of this not surprising
result. Particularly when we know that to be accomplished it is necessary to
dialogue with other cultures, to learn from the genius of others. Today more
than yesterday, in a globalized world, we can measure what such a dialogue
means so that we may be sure that one culture cannot take advantage of the
others. Believing the contrary proceeds from pretentiousness, as Alice L.
Conklin[15] pointed out. So, everyone can claim—as current
research on ethno-anthropology of education does—that “Chaque culture a son
ethos propre qui donne une coloration particulière, intellectuelle morale et
affective à l’éducation dispensée en son sein.”[16]
One could object that the
French West Indians cannot complain because they receive an education in direct
link with their Frenchness. In the words of Césaire, Glissant and other
writter-pedagogists (most of whom are ancient teachers, active teachers,
educators), this is not the case. We find this remark in Césaire’s last book
(an interview with a political analyst of London University): “L’éducation que
nous avons reçue et la conception du monde qui en découle sont responsables de
notre irresponsabilité.”[17]
It seems that this
education is the main cause of our ontological collapse. Glissant who is a
radical maintains that the education received is a demagogy. Nevertheless, he
agrees that the system respects its own logic: the total insertion of the
Martinican in the European community and of the European in Martinique,
concedes the Martinican philosopher[18].
In short, the system is not
in tune with the island(s). Despite the great number of physicians, druggists,
scientists, and other high qualified specialists the education given does not
respect the Martinican and the Guadeloupean in what they feel deeply. It is
worth stressing the same reaction in Haiti. An article in a daily paper brings
to light the sufferance of this people under the cultural influence of France:
“La plupart des ouvrages que nous avons ne correspondent pas aux réalités du
pays. Les manuels, jusqu’à date, reproduisent le modèle français, même quand
ils sont conçus et produits en Haïti.”[19]
P. Chamoiseau, an important
writer of Martinique, expresses some objections about the concept of
universality, about which he energetically protests. His criticism is severe
when he draws our attention: “L’Universel était un bouclier, un désinfectant,
une religion, un espoir, un acte de poésie suprême. L’Universel était un
ordre.”[20]
There is no doubt that on the
islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique (mainly in the latter), everyone is
glossing over the identity problem in connection with education. For sure, the
pain has been identified: it is this political and philosophical doctrine of
which Césaire[21] says that it tends to hide away the
particularities of a person and to kill its personality, namely assimilation.
But we are responsible for a situation that seems impossible to accept.
Consequently, some observers suggest to get rid of any attitude of
self-denigration in order to believe in us[22]. Some medications have been prescribed.
To many of us, they consist only of rhetoric: we have to do this, we must do
that. Thus, everyone agrees that “we must integrate our area [the Caribbean
basin] but at the same time, we develop a discourse of withdrawal into
oneself”, replies Jean-Pierre Sainton[23] a historian of the Université des
Antilles-Guyane. Some of us would talk of Caribbean phobia!
This paradoxical posture is
not surprising. We know the solutions for our difficulties: to educate from our
point of view and conception of the world, not getting rid of our symbolic
production, what we have been doing up to now without a real transformation of
the school programme, of our methods of teaching, etc. Is this a declaration of
principles?
So, faced by this disaster,
we must ask ourselves: What must we do to promote ourselves—to be proud of our
culture (proverbs, sayings, dance, etc.) and to develop pedagogy of pride as
encouraged by Pierre Erny, a French ethnologist of education? This researcher,
who has spent a long time overseas in Africa, is sensitive to these questions
and concludes: “A human group which ignores itself and which is not proud to be
itself is socially ill. Sometimes pedagogy may play a cathartic role.”[24]
We can no longer accept to
walk in the direction we have been going till now, ignoring our culture and not
being able to add our humanity to the younger generations (the basis of a
philosophy of education). By the way, is this not the definition suggested by
the Spanish philosopher Fernando Savater, who said that “L’éducation est la
marque concrète de l’humain apposée là où ce dernier n’était que virtuel”[25]?
We must fabricate this new
man using endogenous cultural materials in order to operate the mutation. It is
to surpass our handicaps, to realize our idiosyncrasies according to Kant’s
anthropology[26]. It is significant that we have never done
that seriously and not jokingly. An anecdotic pedagogic production is not
enough.
3. The new man’s ontological development
Fanon reminds us that in a
colonized and civilized society, people suffer because “all ontology is
unrealizable.”[27] The psychiatrist and philosopher advocate for
the sudden appearance of the new man, one whose ontological development is not
disturbed. However, despite the success of education in these islands (too many
graduates), may we honestly consider that their education has meant the
blossoming of those educated? They are split in their inner being/life.
Undoubtedly, Fanon was prophetic in his thoughts.
The fanonian aspiration to
invent this new being means that the opposite course must be taken. We can
exemplify this by referring to the development of the Creole language. It has
been a long battle for the teaching of it to be authorized by the French
government. It is true that we were not the only region, on the national
territory, which suffered such discrimination. In this connection, France did
not accept to validate European law concerning the regional languages in
Europe. Most certainly our linguistic situation is not the same as in Haiti.
But most of the French West Indians are creolophone—it is the common language.
As Fanon said, “Practising a language is to assume a world, to inhabit a
culture,”[28] or, said otherwise, it is to possess a tool to
access to our essence and existence.
In our islands, we are used
to taking the posture of consumers. We consume all that has been produced
outside our territory, even the concepts made in Europe. The French West Indian
subject is under this dictatorship condition. Our own experience in Haiti close
to some teachers gave us the impression that most of the schools were dependent
on old books out of recent programmes that they received from Guadeloupe, Martinique,
and France. They were unable to cogitate and elaborate their own reflections,
to apprehend their universe and to make dialectics. Have they mastered
Descartes’ aphorism, “I think, therefore I exist.”
Practising this advice is
the guarantee to place one’s life under the logic of self-surpassing. It is
also a mean to liberate one’s creativity and to allow a choice of life. In
fact, to assume our life on this earth –if we follow Augustine’s dialectics of
the two cities, here on earth and in the celestial one. According to Jean-Paul
Sartre, “L’homme est non seulement tel qu’il se conçoit, mais tel qu’il se
veut.”[29]
Conclusion
Kant’s opening to his essay
On education reminds his readers of this fundamental postulate: “man is
the only being who needs education. For by education, he added, we must
understand nurture […] discipline, and scholar […].”[30] In a word, the act of educating is the duty of
each generation in each culture.
The Greeks thought about
the way of practicing this important act of life. Socrates, the conceiver of
philosophy, separated himself from his colleagues the Sophists and did not
follow their teachings. By his ethics, he initiated another method of teaching
based on the idea that the Athens needed some well‑prepared politicians.
In this sense, Plato testifies to his master’s purpose in his dialogues.
About our Caribbean area,
we know the intellectual effervescence to apprehend our reality. The recent
constitution of a Caribbean philosophical Association (CPA) is a sign of this
will.
It is true that till
recently the French islands were isolated. But the ideas go beyond the natural
border that separates us to know, the Caribbean Sea. So, more and more, our
thoughts are spreading from island to island. Aimé Césaire, Frantz Fanon,
Édouard Glissant, Chamoiseau, Confiant are increasingly being read in the
Caribbean and more decision-makers are beginning to understand us.
Education has to take
advice from anthropological research, even despite the politicians whose
posture relies on the postulate that “The republican school despises all
cultural singularities.”[31] According to this discipline, which is
necessary for the philosopher,[32] “L’éducation des êtres humains s’inscrit donc
dans un milieu spécifique qu’il faut caractériser à travers les conditions
extérieures qui vont l’influencer, tel que l’environnement physique, social et
culturel. Il s’agit de repérer les caractéristiques de la société dans
lesquelles l’éducation s’inscrit, tant du point de vue de son système
économique, idéologique que du point de vue social et culturel.”[33]
This postulate is accurate
and fitting to our archipelago. The problem for its French compound is that it
shares its history and destiny with a European nation. So, it does not have the
same opportunities as Jamaica or other islands of the Caribbean basin, a
creolized archipelago. Despite everything, we can share with the others what
gathers us: our common African, Indian, and/or European past.
References and/or complementary bibliography
Benbassa, E; .Bancel, N,
“Le passé colonial de la France: Un écueil historique,” in Le Monde de
l’éducation, no 338, juillet-août 2005, p. 90-93.
Cegarra, M., “Vers une
anthropologie de l’éducation : entre attirance et réserve,” in Spirale,
no 11, 203, p. 19-25.
Césaire, A., Nègre je
suis, nègre je resterai, Paris, A. Michel, 2005, 136 p.
Césaire, A., Discours à
la maison du peuple, Fort-de-France, Editions : PPM/SLND, p. 25-58.
Chamoiseau, P., Une
enfance créole II/ Chemin-d’école, Paris, Gallimard, 1996, 202 p.
Descola, Ph., “Offrir ce
magnifique moteur qu’est la curiosité,” in Le Monde de l’éducation, no
349, Juillet-Août 2006.
Dorwling-Carter, G., “A
quoi sert l’éducation donnée à nos enfants?,” in Antilla, 10 mai 2006,
p. 5.
Erny, P., Essai sur
l’éducation en Afrique noire, Paris, L’Harmattan, 2001, 345 p.
Fanon, F., Peau noire,
masques blancs, Paris, Seuil, 1952.
Flahault, F., Le
paradoxe de Robinson, Paris, Mille et une nuits, 2003.
Glissant, Le discours
antillais, Paris, Seuil, 1997, 803 p.
Kant, E., Anthropologie
d’un point de vue pragmatique, Paris, Vrin, 1991, 170 p.
Kant, On education
(Ueber Paedagogik) The Online Library of liberty.htm, 91 p.
Legrand, J.-L., “Place de
l’anthropologie dans les sciences de l’éducation,” in Spirale, no
11, 203, p. 4-17.
Léotin, M.-H., “Agir pour
l’éducation,” in Cahiers de l’UGTM-éducation, no spécial,
octobre 2002, p. 29-31.
Maldonado-Torres, N.,
“Frantz fanon and C.L.R. James on intellectualism and enlightened rationality,”
in Caribbean Studies, vol. 33, no 2, July-December 2005, p.
149-190.
Reno, F., “L’Europe
tropicale,” in La Tribune des Antilles, no 43, p. 22-23.
Sainton, J.-P., “La caraïbe
qui nous unit: construire une socio-histoire,” in Cahiers de
l’UGTM-éducation, no spécial, novembre 2003, p. 22-23.
Sartre, J.-P., L’existentialisme
est un humanisme, Paris, Gallimard, 1996, 78 p.
Savater, F., Pour
l’éducation, Paris, Rivages poche, 1998, 222 p.
Theodore, J.-M., “La
production d’outils pédagogiques,” in Cahiers de l’UGTM-éducation, no
spécial, octobre 2002, p. 25.
Touraine, A., “Les Français
piégés par leur moi national,” in Le Monde, no 18907, 8
novembre 2005, p. 37.
Yvan-Augustin, A., “L’école
haïtienne, une immense machine en panne,” in Le Nouvelliste, no 37407,
13 Juin 2006, p. 33-35.
***
The American University of
the Caribbean:
Montserrat’s Loss, St. Marteen’s Gain
University of
West Indies, Montserrat
gracelyn.cassell@candw.ms
Background
Montserrat, a tiny, 39.6 sq
miles or 102 sq km, British Overseas Territory, is located in the Eastern
Caribbean chain of islands. Antigua lies approximately 25 miles to the
North East while Guadeloupe is around 30 miles to the South West. Like
many other island microstates, Montserrat suffers from having a small open
economy, a small population and as a consequence, a small local market. The
island has always had to depend on exports and foreign direct investment for
foreign exchange earnings. Economic development thrusts are further
exacerbated by the high cost of transportation and a poor resource base.
Prior to July 1995,
Montserrat could be described as “a middle-income country with admirable sturdy
housing stock, little unemployment and an economy that was in fair shape.”
(Young, 2000) Since then, the island has been in the throes of a volcanic
crisis that has had a major impact on all aspects of life. Two-thirds of
the island, including, the capital Plymouth, the seaport, Bramble’s airport in
the east, and a significant portion of the tourism plant of historic sites and
accommodation in the southern part of the island have been destroyed by
pyroclastic flows. The population which for more than 100 years was constant at
slightly under 12,000 dwindled to 3,500 once the British Government in 1997
provided an assisted evacuation package for those who found living with an
active volcano too difficult. Many persons relocated to neighbouring
Caribbean islands, to the United States under a programme offering Temporary
Protected Status, while the majority relocated to the United Kingdom.
In 1978, the final year of
the Progressive Democratic Party (PDP)’s tenure in government with P. Austin
Bramble as Chief Minister, several projects were introduced in an attempt to
chart a path to sustainable economic development. One of these projects
was the American University of the Caribbean (A.U.C.). In the late 1970s,
Paul S. Tien approached the Government with the idea of setting up an offshore
medical school offering pre-clinical training for students recruited mostly
from North America. Not everyone in the government supported the idea,
but discussions were eventually concluded with the government granting a
license for the start of the school. As outlined in the PDP’s 1978
Manifesto, it was expected that “the recently registered Medical School” would
“provide many job opportunities and generate significant income and revenues
for Montserrat.” (p6) This was all part of an effort to create full
employment on the island. Bramble recognized that having the School on
Montserrat would stimulate the economy in a number of ways as well as create
linkages with the tourism industry. He saw the direct benefits for the
commercial sector and the construction industry.
A.U.C., the first offshore
medical school on Montserrat, was the second school of its kind to be
established in the English-speaking Caribbean. In 1977, St. Georges in
Grenada started its programme and Ross University in Dominica opened its doors
for business in 1979. By the 1980s, there were three more schools
operating in the Commonwealth Caribbean, Spartan Health Sciences University in
St. Lucia (1980), Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine in St. Kitts
(1982) and the University of Health Sciences in Antigua (1983). These
for-profit medical schools responded to an unsatisfied demand for graduate
medical education and a shortage of doctors in North America. Johnson,
Hagopian, Veninga, Fordyce, & Hart
explain: “Beginning in the 1950s, increasing numbers of Americans trained
abroad, either as a first choice or because they failed to obtain entrance into
U. S. schools. Between the 1950s and the mid-1970s, U. S. medical school
admission became more restrictive and numbers of slots declined relative to
residency program opportunities. Competition in the United States,
coupled with the ability to return there for residency training made overseas
medical education attractive for U. S. students, especially in Italy, Belgium,
Spain, France, and Switzerland. In response to the rising demand for
medical education from their own citizens, European schools placed restrictions
on admissions of American students. Schools in Mexico … responded by
increasing recruitment of U. S. students. Additionally, new “offshore”
foreign schools opened during the late 1970s and the early 1980s.” (p3)
A.U.C.’s Early Days
In addition to getting an
investment package which included a 15 year tax holiday and duty-free
importation of materials and equipment, Tien had negotiated for assistance with
the acquisition of land on which he would construct a Campus. The Bramble
government asked that Tien put some EC$250,000 in escrow for construction of
the campus. Tien also wanted the government to get the school listed in the
World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Directory of Medical Schools. The
request for WHO Listing, coming as it was from a British Colony and not a
member of WHO, was not accepted and Chief Minister Bramble, accompanied by
Tien, went to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London to present their
case for the British Government to make the request on Montserrat’s
behalf. According to Bramble, (personal communication, September 27,
2006) the British Government was concerned that by recommending the listing it
would be accountable for something over which it had no control. It
needed reassurance that the School would not bring its name into
ill-repute. It was only when Tien agreed to finance an internationally
recognized review team to assess the school’s academic programme for the
maintenance of standards that the British Government agreed to make the
application for WHO listing. This listing enables students to apply for
federal grants/loans for their medical education.
The island’s weekly
newspaper, the Montserrat Mirror, (New Caribbean School Holds First Classes on
Cincinnati Campus, 1978) using an excerpt from the American Medical News (1978,
September 1), reported as follows: “A new British West Indies-chartered medical
school began its classes in Cincinnati, Ohio, last week because the school’s
$3-million campus on Montserrat island wasn’t ready for occupancy. The American
U. of the Caribbean, School of Medicine (A.U.C.) which bills itself as “the
closest foreign medical school to the continental United States offering an MD
program in English,” has rented space for its 107 first-year students on the
Cincinnati campus of the College of Mt. St. Joseph. A.U.C. has rented
classrooms, labs, and office space for one year. The new school, which offers a
33-month curriculum, has attracted mostly American students. Tuition is
$2,500 per trimester plus a $500 registration fee. A.U.C. officials say the
school has been certified by the United Kingdom and will be listed in the World
Directory of Medical Schools, published by the World Health Organization. The
article went on to explain that the new medical school was founded by Paul S. Tien,
Ph.D., listed as the institution’s chief executive and administrative officer
and that he was a former President of Belmont Technical College in St.
Clairsville, Ohio, a two-year state school and a former chairman of engineering
technologies at Cincinnati Technical College. (p5)
A.U.C.’s early days in Ohio
were not without problems and Tien has to be given credit for not abandoning
the project at that point. According to Lawrence, who refers to
Tien as a China - born electrical engineer claiming to have a Ph.D. in
educational administration from the Union Graduate School, “One of the newest
of the Caribbean medical schools that have sprung up to cater to U.S. Students
unable to gain admission to schools here is still operating -- in Cincinnati,
Ohio—despite more than six months of legal and administrative battles with Ohio
educational authorities… Although Ohio authorities have been arguing since
before A.U.C. opened that it cannot hold classes within the state without being
certified by one of Ohio’s two educational boards, the school claims it is
exempt from state regulations because it is a foreign institution, incorporated
on the tiny British dependency of Montserrat…and it is only in Ohio
temporarily.” (153-4)
Lawrence goes on to
describe further legal complications affecting A.U.C. Two former A.U.C.
students had filed a lawsuit against the school charging it with fraudulent
misrepresentation in several areas. They wanted their money back in
addition to $100,000 in punitive damages. They also asked that “for the
class of all students, former students, and future students of A.U.C., a
permanent injunction prohibiting defendants from soliciting students and
promoting A.U.C. in a false and fraudulent manner, and compensatory damages of
$1,500,000.”
At the same time Lawrence’s
report shows that the student population ranging in age from 22 to 62, had
increased to 210 with 90% of the student body American and 10% from other
countries but with US resident status. The faculty of three had been increased
to 6.
Almost a year later, it was
finally reported (A.U.C. Ready to Break Ground, 1979) that tenders were to be
awarded to local contractors with fourteen of them bidding for a slice of the
72,000 square foot structure. Dr. Tien was still optimistic that the
buildings would be completed in time for an early January move of students from
temporary quarters in Ohio. However, there were several delays that affected
the construction process including delays with procuring materials and delays
caused by bad weather. But by the end of the year the school had long
outstayed its welcome in Ohio and Tien had little choice but to move to
Montserrat in January of 1980. The resulting unhappy state of affairs
that led to students walking the streets of Plymouth with their beds and
mattresses in protest over conditions in the dormitories (Three Weeks of
Classes at A.U.C., 1980) was eventually resolved once the dormitories were
completed. When the Campus itself was completed, it became a tourist
attraction on Montserrat. As Model says: “The Campus at A.U.C. is an
impressive purpose built brick complex consisting of an administrative block,
two teaching blocks containing large lecture rooms (one with closed-circuit
television along the aisles), laboratories, and a library, and dormitory blocks
containing 160 large two-bedded rooms each with bathroom. In addition, there is
a recreation room and a restaurant open to the Caribbean.” (p. 952)
Model gives us an idea of
the costs involved for the student attending the A.U.C. in the 80s.
“Tuition fees are about $10,000 a year, and the students tell me that board and
food cost a further $4,000. The Montserrat course thus costs about
$42,000 to which must be added the cost of fares back and forth to the
USA. Hospitals that accept students from A.U.C. for clinical training are
paid $2,000 a year for each student. (p. 952)
The impact of the presence
of the School on Montserrat was significant. By 1984, it was reported in
the Montserrat Times that a World Bank report credited A.U.C. with the economic
boom on the island. “Because of its small size, the economy of Montserrat
tends to be extremely sensitive to major investment projects.” The report
attributes the 14.5% growth in GDP during 1979 and the first half of 1980 to
construction of the college and to the arrival of 450 students. Almost two
years later, when the Montserrat Times reported (Brandt Represents A.U.C) that
Government had threatened to close the off-shore medical school by January 3,
1986 for non-payment of license fees, the question was asked “What will happen
if A.U.C. is forced out of Montserrat next January? Over sixty
Montserratians will be thrown out of work, many persons would lose rental
income on which they have been depending, taxi men would suffer and shopkeepers
will lose their business.”
During the 1980s, the
school faced several challenges while on Montserrat. The People’s
Liberation Movement (PLM) government which got into power in 1978, replacing
the Bramble regime, immediately set about extracting direct benefits from the
presence of the school on island. The PLM government introduced the The
Universities and Colleges (Licensing and Control) Ordinance in 1980 and
also introduced a student permit fee of US$500. A license fee for the
school was also introduced, which according, to a report in the Opposition
newspaper, (How Osborne’s PLM has Harassed the A.U.C., 1983) moved from
EC$60,000 in 1981 to EC$120,000 annually thereafter. Tien saw this as a
breach of the agreement arrived at with the PDP government and took the PLM
Government to court arguing that the license fee was a violation of the
School’s 15 year tax holiday.
On December 17, 1985, Tien
received a letter from Attorney General Odel Adams (A.U.C. Pays Up, 1986)
indicating that “With effect from the 3rd day of January 1986, no
further issue of work permits will be made to the academic staff of your
institution and all existing work permits shall be reviewed. Secondly, no
person shall be allowed admission to Montserrat either as an existing or
prospective student of the A.U.C. Finally it is Government’s intention to
withdraw its support for the inclusion of your medical school in the sixth
edition of the WHO’s listing of medical schools now in the preparatory stages
of publication.” The Montserrat Chamber of Commerce had to intervene to settle
the problem and Tien paid EC$240,000 which he claimed was a gesture of
goodwill.
Tien was also embroiled in
an industrial dispute with the Montserrat Allied workers Union in 1982.
It seems (MAWU Sets Out its Case Against A.U.C., 1982) that the Union attempted
to have dialogue with Tien once the school started operating in Montserrat but
Tien refused to meet with Union Delegates and asked instead for a list of
members working at A.U.C. In February 1982, a shop steward was fired and
the following day, there was a sick out by all Union members and picketing the
day after that. Locals were concerned about the signals being sent to
potential investors. Tien finally agreed to meet with Union officials and an
agreement was signed on February 18. However, Tien threatened on the
following day to close the cafeteria and to outsource janitorial services
actions that would have affected 14 and 20 workers respectively. Students
and faculty indicated their displeasure over the disruption of classes by what
they regarded as “industrial foolishness.” (Our Readers Say, 1982)
Despite his rocky relations
with the Government, Tien did not avoid opportunities to demonstrate that he
was a good corporate citizen. As early as 1980, he donated all of the
fencing for the western and northern sides of Sturge Park and provided
financial assistance to the various sporting associations on the island.
(A.U.C. to Help Sturge Park, 1984). The community was allowed to use the
facilities for sports including tennis and volley ball courts at the College
and it was only in the 1990s that a fee was charged for the use of the tennis
courts.
The students also played a
part in building bridges of friendship. The A.U.C. against the Montserrat
Amateur Athletic Association meet was regarded as an opportunity to further
improve the “bonds of friendship between A.U.C.[‘s] students and the local
community.” (A.U.C. and M.A.A.A. Compete, 1981). The first A.U.C. Tennis
Tournament that was held had involvement and participation from the Montserrat
community. (A.U.C. Tennis Tourney: An Outstanding Success, 1985).
Threats in the Environment
In addition to difficulties
with the government and the Union, Tien also had internal problems and external
forces creating threats to the survival of his school. In 1982, he fired Dr.
DiVirgilio who was the first Dean of the Faculty of Medicine. According
to the report (A.U.C. Threatened, 1982), DiVirgilio was involved in the
formation of a new school in Antigua, a school that was trying to lure faculty
and students away from A.U.C. The report goes on to say: “There has been
much talk within the student body of late, concerning problems at A.U.C.
It is alleged also that some faculty members have not been terribly happy with
the conditions under which they have been operating. Whereas they enjoy
Montserrat and like teaching, some faculty members have complained about the
School’s administration. Tien placed the blame for the problems on the fact
that the supply of students had been steadily falling with only 250 expected to
attend A.U.C. the following semester as opposed to 320 the previous
semester. “Dr. Tien blames the economic conditions in the United States
for this poor showing. In addition new offshore schools are springing up
in different places and drawing some of the students who would otherwise come
to A.U.C..”
Not long after, Tien
dismissed another member of faculty, Dr. Ranjit S. Nagi, Associate Dean of
Medical Studies and expelled Mr. Nelson Bolagi Akande, a second semester
student, and Miss Bosede Kufodu Uboh, a third semester student who were accused
of being (New Medical School, 1982) “guilty of subversion in that they were
actively involved with the formation of a new medical school in Antigua and
carried out a campaign to recruit A.U.C. students for the Antigua
School.” (Antigua School No Threat, 1982)
Then in 1984, (Tricks
Pulled on A.U.C.) it seems that staff from St. Georges University were on the
A.U.C. campus attempting to “recruit students and staff members from
A.U.C.” According to Tien, “Our students were offered one free semester
and told that they could be assured of good clinical rotation. They were
even offered a free flight to Grenada and our faculty members were told that
they would get higher salaries.” By April, Tien took action again St.
Georges University (A.U.C. Files Writ Against Grenada’s Medical School, 1984)
taking out an injunction against all of the defendants to restrain them from
carrying out similar acts against A.U.C. in the future.
Yet another threat reared
its head on the horizon. It would seem (What’s A.U.C.’s fate, 1986) that the
U.S. Senate was considering a bill “that could mean the death of A.U.C. and the
4 other off-shore medical schools presently operating in the Caribbean.
The bill states, that in order for U.S. students attending off-shore schools to
be eligible for student grants, the schools must have an enrolment of at least
60 per cent nationals.” But “students, graduates and parents, have written
to their congressmen in support of the school, asking that the senate bill be
thrown out.” It would seem that their efforts were successful.
In the wake of the 1984
closure of the University of St. Lucia School of Medicine (USLSM) which started
in 1983, Tien claims (A.U.C. Takes Stand on The Issue Of Academic Excellence,
1984) that the success of his school was as a result of placing priority on
high standards of medical education and having a first rate faculty.
According to Tien, of the fifty students from USLSM that were interviewed by
A.U.C. representatives who had flown to St. Lucia, only five met A.U.C.’s
entrance requirements.
There is evidence that
efforts were made over the years to ensure that the medical programme at A.U.C.
was regularly assessed. In 1983, a team (New York State Looks at A.U.C.,
1983) visited the school to evaluate the pre-clinical programme and also
visited the hospitals in New York where students would be placed for the
clinical programme. One year later (California Officials expected at
A.U.C. Next Week, 1985), representatives of the California Legislature Senate
Committee on Business and Professions, the California Medical Association and
the California Dental Association were reported as being expected to review
Medical and Dental schools in the Caribbean for accreditation and
licensure. These reviews would have been costly to A.U.C. but necessary
since student placements in US hospitals were and still are dependent on
positive reports on the school. This is supported by a Sounding Board
report. “Several States have developed mechanisms to permit students at certain
foreign medical schools to take part in clerkships within the states’
jurisdiction…New York State Board of Medicine jointly grants approval to
certain foreign medical schools that want to place students in New York-based
clinical clerkships. Such approvals have been given to St. George’s
University School of Medicine on the island of Grenada, Ross University School
of Medicine on Dominica, the American University of the Caribbean on St.
Maarten, Netherlands Antilles (formerly Montserrat)... p. 1603
Having overcome various
man-made challenges, the School continued its operations in Montserrat until
faced with the fury of nature in the form of Hurricane Hugo which battered the
island on September 17, and left the Campus in shambles. Tien found a new
home for the School at the Wayland Baptist Church in Plainview, Texas, while
plans were in place for rebuilding the Campus. Keynote speaker at the
1991 graduation, Kenneth Cassell, Kenny Cassell remarked: “This event is
important for the A.U.C. because it exploded the myth, popular at least for a
brief while, that Dr. Tien and his associates would take the opportunity to
close down their operations here and perhaps permanently relocate to another
country.”
The fact that Dr. Tien and
his associates achieved their target of restarting classes here just one year
after the massive damages to the campus by Hugo, is testimony to their
continued interest in the island, but more so to their dedication and
determination to succeed in whatever they undertake.” (p. 13)
The Move to St. Maarten
Once the volcanic crisis
started, there was not only an exodus of persons but an exodus of several
businesses from the island, among them the A.U.C. Tien’s contingency plan
was for the school to relocate to St. Maarten. As reported in Campus
Connection: “After the Soufrière Hills volcano began erupting on Montserrat in
July 1995, American University of the Caribbean found a new home about 100
miles southeast on the island of St. Maarten. Today A.U.C. students find
themselves on a beautiful, contemporary campus specifically designed to meet a
medical student’s needs. The academic facilities offer future doctors the tools
for earning a high-quality medical education including fully equipped gross
anatomy, histology and microbiology laboratories, and clinical patient
examination room. The four lecture halls on campus feature the latest
audio/visual technology, and the extensive library subscribes to more than 100
medical and scientific journals. It would seem that St. Maarten has seen some
benefits from having the School on its shores. The Daily Herald (A.U.C.
Expanding Third Phase Soon, 2003) reports that “Wescott-Williams, who is also
Second Lt. Governor, described A.U.C.'s 25th anniversary as a milestone.
A.U.C. has committed itself to St. Maarten and stuck to this commitment since
1996," she said. She alluded to the school's Department of Community
Services, which contributes significantly to the community. Similar sentiments
were expressed by Commissioners Laveist, Heyliger and other speakers.”
Conclusion
It has been recognized that
the lower cost of providing medical education in the Caribbean, (offshore
medical schools run an accelerated programme which eliminates holidays and they
also avoid the costs associated with research and a teaching hospital) along
with investment incentives including tax holidays and other concessions dangled
by Caribbean Governments, have made the region an attractive environment for
offshore medical schools. Indeed, it is now being suggested that
offshore medical education could very well be a niche market for Caribbean
countries.
“Offshore education, and, in
particular, medical schools, represent a small but growing services sector that
has responded to a growing (and unfulfilled) demand for physicians in the
United States. St. George's University School of Medicine in Grenada and Ross
University School of Medicine in Dominica are two of 23 primarily offshore
medical schools in the region, whose graduates together account for close to 70
percent of the international medical graduates entering the US. Demographic
trends suggest continued demand for international physicians in the US,
suggesting a significant opportunity for continued growth of this sector. To
continue to meet this demand, and deepen the economic impact of the sector, the
region should focus on creating a robust investment climate by raising accreditation
standards, supporting regional accreditation agencies, and moving towards a
harmonized and transparent investment regime, including encouraging FDI in the
higher education sector.” (xxix)
Politicians in Montserrat
are regarding the newly registered British International University with
investors from Dubai, as a reincarnation of an A.U.C. project. The
School was registered in April of this year and has already approached the
Caribbean Accreditation Authority for Education in Medicine and other Health
Professions (CAAM) for the review process to start. This is an important step
if the British Government is to make the request for WHO listing. The search is
also in progress for temporary accommodation before their Campus is
built.
This project has the
potential for a positive impact on Montserrat’s economy unlike those schools
licensed in previous years. The St. John’s University of Medicine that was
registered in 2003 was the brainchild of Dr. Daniel Harrington who once taught
at A.U.C. The School rented accommodation for a short period and had to
face various legal battles including infringement of copyright. (New Offshore
Medical School Hopes to Open in Early 2004, 2003). The University of
Science Arts and Technology was incorporated when the Government of Montserrat
and the Medical School of London signed an agreement. (Medical School of London
Signs Accord to Start Here, 2003). To date, this School which has bought
property and converted it into a Campus, has not yet received WHO Listing which
affects its ability to recruit students. The Atlanta Seoul University was
licensed in 2003, rented space and for a short period used local talent for
delivering its teaching programme. The School currently has no presence on
island.
The A.U.C. story suggests
that it is necessary to plan with contingencies in place for the
unforeseen. Entrepreneurs wanting to get into the now highly competitive
offshore education business need venture capital and a commitment to
maintaining standards. The student recruitment process, the teaching programme,
faculty and facilities should be able to stand up to scrutiny. At
the same time, the Government of Montserrat needs to give serious consideration
to the types and numbers of institutions that can feasibly operate on the
island. Projects without a significant investment component will hardly
attract the kind of benefits that were realized with A.U.C. Each
application should be considered carefully and taken through a rigorous due
diligence exercise, the danger is there that the Government could, as happened
with the offshore banking industry, be held liable for activities undertaken by
schools that it has allowed to operate on the island. This calls for
proper monitoring mechanisms, policies and procedures for the efficient
management of the offshore education sector. Untenable delays on the part
of Government affect the investor negatively. In the absence of a
national accreditation authority, the Government would do well to maintain
links with reputable accreditation institutions to ensure that standards are
maintained in the schools that operate on island. It is understandable
that governments are eager for any economic activity which will result in
growth. However, it is important that these activities and their possible
impact on the society are thoroughly assessed before they are implemented.
References and/or complementary bibliography
A.U.C. and M.A.A.A.
compete. (1981, July 21). Montserrat Times, p. 9.
A.U.C.
expanding, third phase soon. (2003, August 15). The Daily Herald. Retrieved
on September 30, 2006, from http://thedailyherald.com/news/daily/g76/auc76.html
A.U.C. files
writ against Grenada’s Medical School. (1984, April 19) Montserrat
Times, p.10
A.U.C. pays up.
(1986, January 10) Montserrat Reporter, p.8
A.U.C. ready to
break ground. (1979, June 23) The Montserrat Mirror, p. 12.
A.U.C. to help
Sturge Park. (1984, February 3). Montserrat Times, p. 11
A.U.C. takes
stand on the issue of academic excellence. (1984, March 23) p. 8.
A.U.C. tennis
tourney: An outstanding success. (1985, December 13) Montserrat Times,
p. 9.
A.U.C.
threatened. (1982, April 23) The Montserrat Mirror, p. 1.
Antigua School
No Threat. (1982, August 20) Montserrat Mirror, p. 10.
Brandt
Represents A.U.C. (1985, December). The Montserrat Times, 5(34),
p. 1.
Campus
connection: Welcome to the St. Maarten campus. (2006). AUC Connections,
1. Retrieved on October 7, 2006 from: http://www.aucmed.edu/aucconnections/Archive/WinterSpring06/campuswelcome.htm
Cassell,
K. Greater co-operation between Government and A.U.C. needed. (1991,
April 5). Montserrat Reporter, p. 13, 18.
Former
U.S. A.G. to speak at A.U.C. graduation. (1984, January 20). The Montserrat
Times, p. 1.
How
Osborne’s PLM has harassed the A.U.C. (1983, February 11). Montserrat
Times, p. 10.
Johnson,
K.E., Hagopian, A., Veninga, C., Fordyce, M.A. & Hart, L.G.
(2005). The changing geography of Americans graduating from foreign
medical schools (Working Paper No. 96. Washington: University of
Washington, Department of Family Medicine. WWAMI Center for Health Workforce
Studies.
Latin America and the Caribbean
Region. Poverty Reduction and Economic Management Unit. Caribbean Country
Management Unit. (2005). A time to choose: Caribbean development in the 21st
century. (Confidential Report No. 31725-LAC). Washington, D.C.: World Bank. Retrieved on January 30, 2006 from:
Lawrence, Susan
V. (1979, March 10). A moveable
med school. Science News, 115 (10) 153-155.
MAWU sets out its case
against A.U.C. (1982, March 5) Montserrat Times, p. 6.
Model, D. G. (1984, April
28). Montserrat: An offshore medical school. Lancet, 1(8383):
952-953.
New Caribbean school holds
first classes on Cincinnati Campus. (1978, September 23) Montserrat Mirror,
p. 5.
New medical school.
(1982, May 7) The Montserrat Mirror, p. 1.
New medical school enmeshed
in fight over accreditation. (1978, August 25). The Washington Post, p.
A11.
New Offshore Medical School
Hopes to Open in Early 2004. (2003, August 15). The Montserrat Reporter, p.
2.
New York State looks at
A.U.C. (1983, March 25). Montserrat Times, p. 10.
Our readers say. (1982,
February 26). Montserrat Times, p. 4-5.
Progressive Democratic
Party Manifesto 1978: A Charter for Continued Progress. (1978). St.
Johns, Antigua: Antigua Printing & Publishing Ltd.
Sounding board:
Nonaccredited medical education in the United States. (2000) The New
England Journal of Medicine, 342(21): 1602-5.
Three weeks of classes at
A.U.C. (1980, February 2). Montserrat Mirror, p. 12.
Tricks Pulled on A.U.C. (1984,
March 30). Montserrat Times, p. 10.
What’s A.U.C.’s fate.
(1986, September 19). The Montserrat Reporter, p.1.
Young,
I. J. (2000). Montserrat: Post volcano reconstruction and
rehabilitation – A case Study. Montserrat: Department for International
Development. Retrieved on January 30, 2006 from http://www.corporate.coventry.ac.uk/content/1/c6/01/02/90/MONTSERRAT%20POST%20VOLCANO%20RECONSTRUCTION%20AND%20REHABILITATION.pdf#search=%22ian%20jardine%20young%20montserrat%22
The General Agreement on
Trade in Services
and Education in the Caribbean:
Three Case Studies
PhD candidate, University
of the West Indies, Barbados
Introduction
In this article “Caribbean”
refers to The Commonwealth Caribbean. This term describes the archipelago of
islands, which form the eastern boundary of the Caribbean Basin. It includes as
well the mainland nations of Belize (British Honduras) and Guyana (formerly
British Guiana): these and most of the islands – Barbados, Jamaica, Trinidad
and Tobago, Dominica, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Grenada; St.
Kitts and Nevis, Antigua and Barbuda, are independent nations. Anguilla,
Montserrat, the British Virgin Islands, the Northern islands (the Cayman
Islands, the Turks and Caicos Islands) are British dependencies or territories.
The Commonwealth of the Bahamas, geographically part of the Northern islands,
is also independent.
The impact of globalisation
on national education systems is very significant for the Caribbean. Much of
Caribbean education planning, historically and presently, has been based on the
concept that it is by national education that societies can be transformed to
move them from the Third to the First World. The emphasis on education as a key
to upward economic mobility can be considered successful strategy: The region
is relatively poor, with an average per capita income of less than US$3000
(about a tenth of the average for OECD countries). All of the Caribbean
countries are categorised as “developing” and have managed to survive
significant economic pressures. It has been a difficult balancing act to
preserve political stability in the midst of difficult social and financial
pressures and the threat posed from drug trafficking.
As predominantly small
island states, the Caribbean faces similar challenges to those in the South
Pacific and Mediterranean regions. The World Bank has described them as
being mostly small, very open and limited in their export base as well as being
very vulnerable to natural disasters. According to the World Bank World
Development Indicators 2006, except for Guyana (lower middle), Caribbean
economies may be classified as upper middle income by using per capita income
measures, although much less advanced than others such as Brazil, Argentine,
Chile and Mexico. The importance of education has grown because of the
necessity to train workers for a technologically advanced economy locally and
in terms of job opportunities abroad.
Education in the Caribbean
Much as in Great Britain
and Europe, Caribbean public education was initially conceived in the 1800’s as
a force to produce workers and as a tool for social control (through discipline
and religion) in the colonies. In the 20th century, until the 70’s,
education was used to promote nation building and representative democracy with
the change to internal self-government. In the post-independence era,
educational provision was expanded and there were determined efforts to address
equity in access and to promote the development of a national and Caribbean
identity. There were also major investments to improve and expand quality
educational provisions at all levels, including teacher training, examinations
and educational research.
The University of the West
Indies was founded in 1948 at the Mona campus in Jamaica, as a University
College in a special relationship with the University of London. In 1962 the
University achieved independent status In addition to the three main campuses
(Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and Barbados) the University has centres in all
of its non-campus Caribbean countries and has a distance education programme.
The courses and examinations for general degrees of the University are common
to all three campuses. Of the professional faculties, agriculture and engineering
are located at St. Augustine, law at Cave Hill, and medical sciences at Mona.
There are schools of medicine, dentistry and veterinary science at the St.
Augustine campus. All the contributing territories have policies of subsidising
students up to tertiary level.
Most Caribbean countries
spend a significant amount of their government budget on education. Since the
late 1990’s, education has been driven by essentially economic ends- material
progress, the impetus of consumerism (especially driven by location within the
American hegemony); the need to ensure technology sophistication and fit into
the global marketplace by exploiting whatever “comparative advantage” is
available. Issues of global competitiveness are of paramount importance given
that the area is, on its own, a small market, and cannot compete as a low wage
business environment. Caribbean people are convinced of the close correlation
between expenditure on education and education and economic performance.
This is borne out by Table 3, which compares Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and
Barbados.
In 1997, Commonwealth
Caribbean Heads of Government committed themselves to the implementation of
specific measures related to education. They agreed on a number of goals for
priority implementation including universal quality secondary education and 15
per cent enrolment of the post-secondary group in tertiary-level education by
the year 2005. This is still far below the level of post-secondary enrolment of
developed countries and some countries in the region itself. Heads of
Government recognised that knowledge is now the central factor of
competitiveness. They emphasised the importance of lifelong learning and the
need to develop and apply science and technology to the production of goods and
services. They agreed to enlist the active participation of the private sector
in policy development, planning, implementation and financing for relevant
education and training towards the development of creative and adaptive
individuals as well as skilled labour for the key economic sectors of industry,
agriculture and services, in particular tourism.
For the Caribbean, tertiary
education (i.e., education beyond secondary education), includes degree courses
taken for college or university credits or non-degree courses undertaken for
personal edification or pleasure to upgrade work-related skills. Post-secondary
education in the Caribbean is very varied. The base of publicly funded
institutions has traditionally been supplemented by private institutions sometimes
with government subsidies. In several states, overseas campuses, mostly
of American institutions, and franchising arrangements have been
multiplying.
Globalisation
The United
Nations Development Programme has defined globalisation as: “the widening and
deepening of international flows of trade, finance and information in a single,
integrated global market.”
Much of the
impetus of globalisation arises from the impact of trade agreements such as
GATT (the General agreement on Trade and Tariffs) and more recently GATS (the
General Agreement on Trade in Services) under the aegis of the World Trade
Organisation (WTO) (see Appendix 1).
The GATS, the
General Agreement on Trade in Services, is the first multilateral agreement for
trade in services. It aims to liberalise international trade in services which
now has greater growth potential than international trade in goods: even in
less-developed countries about 50% of GDP comes from non-government service
industries and the proportion is much greater and increasing even more rapidly
in developed countries (World Development Report 2006).
A commitment
under GATS is a formal agreement to liberalise trade in particular services
with or without limitations. Although there is no compulsion to liberalise
trade immediately, according to GATS, all countries that are signatories to the
agreement are committed to future steps of liberalisation. In education,
commitments can be made under 5 sub-sectors – primary, secondary, higher, adult
and other education services. Limitations may be made dealing with nationality
requirements, restrictions on foreign teachers, subsidies to national
establishments, qualifications and accreditation etc. Formerly government controlled
services, such as health and education, are vulnerable to being used as pawns
in WTO negotiations to secure advantages in other areas.
Globalisation and Education
UNDP’s John
Ohhoierhan said in an article in Co- op South (1995):“Countries of the South…
need to come to terms fully with globalisation in order to make the appropriate
changes in their development agenda and strategies.” (p.2)
The Caribbean
has relied heavily on education for social and economic development. In some
cases the movement from the Third to the First World has been physical with
emigrants attractive to their destination societies because of their
competencies and skills. Education has also enabled Caribbean governments to
attract foreign investment, whether for setting up offshore factories or and
banks or onshore hotels and businesses. In other words the infrastructural
progress made has been based on the use of education as a vehicle of national
development, especially in latter years, from an agriculture-based economy to industrialisation
and now global economic competitiveness.
State planning
and implementation have had a pivotal role in expanding mass education and
ensuring that investment in schooling is profitable to the nation. The
implications of globalisation for national education are enormous. What control
should, could or would the state have? What characteristics in terms of a
national public and collective identity would education have? What would be the
philosophy and emphases in order to prepare students for not only national but
also international or global labour markets? How does trade liberalisation
affect the capacity and strength of local and regional education strategies to
respond to local and regional needs and even to survive competition? There are
many concerns about the infringement by global institutions and agreements and
by transnational corporations on the power of the state. States in a globalised
world must inform, equip and empower themselves with appropriate strategies.
Traditional
education institutions all over the world have had to rethink their place in
wider society to respond to changing expectations. Certainly, in the British
tradition, which predominates in the Caribbean, education is not traditionally
regarded as a commodity. Yet, the liberalisation of international trade in
education, as fuelled by the activities of the WTO and the operation of the
General Agreement in Trades and Services (GATS), has produced a rapid growth in
an alternative education market. Internationalisation has meant the growth of
borderless education and considerable commercialisation. Also, developing
countries, in striving to provide mass education at all levels, have been
experimenting with distance learning and Open and Virtual universities.
Corporate Universities have been established to provide transnational and other
corporations with employees who have the requisite common skills across
boundaries and to facilitate optimal deployment globally. The alternative
education market in the United States has grown and focused on the demand for
provision of opportunities for life-long learning. Fast-paced private branches
of foreign colleges and institutions could be considered the thin edge of the
wedge in terms of the impact of globalisation on education in the Caribbean:
tertiary institutions have geared up to export testing and tuition services at
highly competitive rates.
There are also
practical social issues – culture and cohesion, the digital divide, equity and
equality in education provisions, planning, sourcing and financing of
education. There are issues relating to the privatisation of educational
services which may be detrimental to public access to the best educational
provisions. Apart from the economic considerations, for example, the return on
investments in personnel training, there are other intangible issues such as
cultural penetration and the maintenance of appropriate standards.
The University
of the West Indies is one of the most successful regional universities in terms
of its standard, service and contribution to social and economic progress and
is increasingly attractive to international students. However, its future role
and expansion has to be considered in the context of globalisation, both in
terms of the provision of expanded and relevant higher education programmes and
offering new services as well as meeting the challenge of competition. The
testing services of the Caribbean Examination Council at all levels will be
challenged by extra-regional competition. As the private sector recognises
market opportunities it will seek to provide products which can compete.
The Association of Caribbean Tertiary (Level) Institutions, whose members
include community colleges has recognised the need for a development of Quality
Assurance and accreditation strategies. The removal of trade barriers and the
increased availability of foreign exchange dramatically improved opportunities
to study for foreign qualifications to get comparative advantage in most
national regional and international labour markets. It may even be cheaper to
study in OVC’s (overseas campuses) than local and further more traditional
subsidies and development strategies may put Caribbean states at risk in terms
of the GATS anti-protectionism regulations.
Trends in
globalisation issues related to education, especially higher education, have
generated considerable debate and action amongst stakeholders and their
organisations particularly in developed countries. Amongst developed countries,
both individual and regional governments are making plans for their education
systems. The UK government has formally declared itself committed to
liberalising trade in services. Some developed countries, e.g. Canada and the
EU, have voluntarily announced that they will not deal with education in their
trade offers. In the Asian-Pacific region, countries such as Australia, New
Zealand, Singapore and Korea have clearly developed and implemented strategies
regarding education services.
In order to
compete locally and globally developing country higher education institutions
face financing challenges. In general, the financing of educational provisions
is a major consideration influenced by structural and administrative
consequences of partnerships between educational and business institutions. The
role of government in financing and determining curricula with regard to
national strategic planning has different implications in developing and
developed countries.
Becoming a
Member of WTO involves two types of commitments and a web of complex trade
rules (see Appendix I). Not joining in the GATS means risking exclusion from
equal access to markets and losing favourable access to important export areas.
A critical aspect of the GATS is non-reciprocity. In other words, a Member is
not obliged to open up to another Member even when its proposals have been
accepted. The USA is particularly adamant in reserving untouchable areas of its
education policies whilst demanding that other countries remove ‘restrictions’
or ‘barriers’.
Two major
issues that arise from dealing with education in terms of the trading in a
service. The WTO and some of its members talk about an Education Market -
as a global market opportunity. This is in stark contrast to the gut feeling of
most educators and trade unionists, and, indeed the general public especially
in the Caribbean, that education is a public good, which should not be traded
as a commodity particularly if this interferes with the responsibility of
states to provide equitable education to their citizens. Both sides can define
types of barriers except that they are on opposite sides of the fence:
Barriers to
trade in services in the GATS context.
These trade-restrictive practices are considered impediments to one of the
fundamental goals of the WTO- free trade—opening up of markets – trade
liberalization. These are usually defined by the developed countries in their
request documents as they strive to ensure clear passage for their institutions
into the developing countries .It should be noted that developing country providers
face similar barriers if they attempt to break into developed markets. For
example, there are non-recognition of qualifications, visa and immigration
restrictions for students and professionals, considerable barriers to the
establishment of commercial or professional presence such as accreditation,
financial barriers, needs tests and other barriers to the movement of natural
persons. Liberalisation holds no promise of reciprocity.
Barriers to the
delivery by national governments of social services to their citizens – with goals of removing social inequality and
stratification based on class and finance and directed towards developing
genuine democracy and economic viability. Certainly for developing countries
these goals require the development and maintenance of public quality education
systems as a normal and necessary part of their development strategy. Utilising
the available resources often means supporting students’ education at private
institutions.
Of the members
of WTO only 44 member states including 3 Caribbean states – Haiti, Trinidad and
Jamaica – have made commitments to trade in Education Services (see Appendix
Table 2). Only 21(15 developing and 6 transition) countries have included
commitments in higher education and among those making unconditional
commitments in higher education are the Congo, Sierra Leone, Lesotho, and
Jamaica. The European Union made some commitments but with limitations on all
modes. The USA, New Zealand, Australia and Japan all of whom submitted
negotiating proposals have limitations on some if not all modes and sectors.
Canada remains uncommitted in public education. Some commentators have
suggested that those developing countries, which have liberalised their
education sectors, have done so partly through incomplete understanding of the
implications and in the hope of receiving much needed assistance. The strongest
opposition to what is termed the commodification of education has come from
North American and European education unions and associations – the Association
of Universities and Colleges of Canada, the American Council on Education
(USA), The European University Association, the Council of Higher Education
Accreditation, the Association of Universities and the National Association of
Teachers in Higher Education (UK) and the global union, Education
International. The developing countries which are now committed might have
acted otherwise had there been more consultation and openness with their
education unions about decision making. In a resolution published in the 1998
entitled World Declaration on Higher Education for the Twenty-first Century,
Vision and Action, UNESCO advised its member institutions to refrain from
making commitments in higher education and if already committed, to make no
further commitments.
Those countries
which have already made commitments could opt for progressive Liberation
(Article XIX) and possibly request modification to a Schedule of commitment
(XXI). This has been the advice given to the Jamaican government in the
Jamaican National Council on Education (NACE) report.
The Regional
Negotiating Machinery (RNM) Report on “International Supply of Tertiary
Education and Services Trade Negotiations: Implications for Caricom” (2004)
warned: “States that have not made any commitments in their tertiary education
sector must proceed cautiously and only make commitments that will serve their
best interests. The complexity of the trade negotiations warrants the need for
technical assistance on behalf of the developing countries. “ (p.ii) and, with
respect to the US: “ as the leading provider of services in TLE (Tertiary Level
Education) and as a member of the WTO, the US has sought (from all other
Members) ‘full commitments for market access and national treatment in modes
1,2 and 3 for higher education and training services, for adult education, and
for ‘other’ education…. Given …non-reciprocity, CARICOM States would be well
advised not to accede to this request … (since) developed countries are much
more competitive in this sector and Caribbean domestic providers are not ready
yet for an open, market driven environment." (p. iii)
In Jamaica, and
generally in the Caribbean, it is at the tertiary level that ill-advised
commitment has the most costly and serious implications. The GATS
documents appear to use the terms ‘higher’ and ‘tertiary’ interchangeably when
referring to education. The GATS defines higher education thus: “(it) includes
two distinct groups: one relates to the teaching of practical skills in
post-secondary, sub-degree technical and vocational education institutions and
the other details with more theoretical educational services provided by
universities, colleges and specialized professional schools”. In the
Caribbean, the second group is more frequently described as tertiary level
education/ institutions (TLE’s or TLI’s).
The RNM Report
says that for Caribbean TLI’s, the environment is one where individual
countries are at different levels in terms of legislation, policy and procedure
with respect to access to their TLE markets, but they have traditionally
allowed foreign providers on a case-by- case basis. The criteria applied
examining how each provider fits into government education policies and
requirements, and has the capacity to fulfil governments’ development
strategies. There are many examples of various foreign provider arrangements
such as twinning, partnerships and branch institutions. Each Caricom state has
a different reality in both needs and policies, which makes it difficult but
not impossible to negotiate jointly. However negotiating separately especially
against the large, well-endowed and experienced negotiating machineries of the
developed countries is not a winning option. Under the GATS market forces not
social and environmental or local human resource development considerations
will be the guiding criteria.
In signing the
GATS agreements, many developing countries thought they would attract foreign
providers to assist in building sustainable education for the future. This has
not happened: for example in the Philippines, Senegal and Jamaica, foreign
providers are undercutting local universities and colleges. The GATS ignores
equity concerns between rich and poor countries or within countries for example
in negotiating procedures. There are concerns that the education sector like
education could be traded off to break a deadlock in other sectors.
Regional/bilateral Free trade agreements are more ambitious and far reaching
than may be immediately apparent. The pros and cons of making offers in
tertiary education in an effort to improve the quality of tertiary education
have to be carefully evaluated including the risks that national protection
regulations may be challenged as falling foul of the GATS rules
Most people agree that education is a public good but that there must be a
nuanced position on role of the private sector. Developing states need
strategies to put appropriate regulation in place and to manage liberalisation.
Several articles and speeches have recommended a co-ordinated Southern response
to globalisation. Concerns have been expressed about the weakness of developing
countries in international fora with regard to fair participation in decision
making and enjoyment of benefits. The contrasting experiences of Jamaica,
Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados support the urgent need to share concerns and
negotiating strategies and strengths.
The Jamaica Experience
“Jamaica is part of the
global village of this century of open borders, easy travel, mass migration and
easy access to information and technology. We are no longer educating our
people to live in Jamaica. We are preparing them for a borderless world. Times
have changed and we too must change. We must critically examine the product,
and together as a nation, make the necessary changes that are called for.”
Jamaica Prime Minister, PJ
Patterson, in his speech to launch the Education Transformation process in
February 2004: “Public Education is a central pillar of democratic society and
public institutions, from primary school to university, ideally prepare
students to be loyal citizens who play a role in shaping their societies. The
reality is that most if not all public education systems offer some service on
a basis of payment or in competition with a private education provider. In this
regard, Jamaica is no exception.”
Jamaica National Council on Education (2004)
Jamaica is the
largest island of the Commonwealth Caribbean with over two and a half million
people in an area of about 11000 km2. Since 1973 Jamaica has been a
member of the Caribbean Community and Common Market (Caricom) and since January
2006 the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME). Regional ties are very
important because of the potential to facilitate sharing of
information, develop a common policy and strengthen negotiating power in WTO
meetings. Jamaica joined WTO in March 1995. Its commitments in education
under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) have some unforeseen
and potentially negative implications for the Jamaican government and the
Caribbean region with respect to provision of education services in the
Caribbean.
The Jamaican
Government’s commitment to education is typical for the region. The statistics
cited are from the Jamaican National Council on Education document “The GATS:
Higher Education & The Implications for National Economies (Jamaica)“
(2003). The budget expenditure in 2000 on education is about 15% with 17% of
that for higher education. Students’ fees for higher education used to be
totally covered by the government. Now they contribute to the economic cost 10%
at non-degree level and about 18% at the degree level for the Jamaica
University of Technology and the University of the West Indies. The government
is the single largest provider of higher (including post-secondary)
education. Dealing with approximately 800,000 students primary to tertiary
level, the government spends in its budget JA$30billion with households
spending about JA $19 billion; these are supplemented by additional government
expenditure through deferred financing for school building and funding from the
Jamaica Investment Fund as well as further substantial expenditure from
institutions especially the church. This was all part of a cost-sharing
programme where students and families bear part of the costs of education. It was
envisaged that school fees would be frozen at 2003/4 levels and removed by
2005-06.
In Jamaica at
all levels there is national or transnational private education and
institutions must be registered with the University Council of Jamaica, which accredits
courses and awards degrees on behalf of institutions that do not have the power
to do so. There are number of foreign providers with accredited programmes
offering these through local branch campuses, local partners, franchise or
distance education. There are a number of private locally owned institutions at
all tertiary levels. In order to increase and upgrade its teaching staff
and facilities it has been projected that Jamaica needs to spend an additional
JA$219 billion over the next 10 years. According to the National Council on
Education, the government would find it very difficult to significantly
increase the education budget particularly at the tertiary level. Yet, with the
“no limitations” on Mode 3, the Jamaican government could be required to fund a
potentially large market of foreign suppliers, who are providing education to
Jamaican nationals. Any financial support by governments for students or
institutions may be considered as subsidies with respect to GATS rules. This
support is present in the Caribbean region since the TLI’s could not provide on
their own supply services at a affordable price. Moreover according to GATS
rules any part of an educational institution which functions on a profit-making
basis would bring the institution under the GATS rules for national treatment
since then it would not be considered as totally financed by government but be
in competition with private providers.
The country’s
National Council on Education in 2003 gave as its opinion that government
higher education services in Jamaica could be regarded a trade in services
since they are offered “in competition” with private provisions such as
Northern Caribbean University (locally owned and administered) and the Florida
International University (foreign owned and operated). Furthermore the
government provides the operating costs of several high schools owned by
Denominations and Trusts; i.e. it subsidises private institutions at the
secondary level too.
In general
Jamaica’s horizontal commitments are only restrained by the country’s
immigration laws with respect to residency, work permits and taxation. From
Table 2 Jamaica has made Market Access undertakings for modes 1, and 2, and
even in 3 but for required local certification, registration and licensing – meaning
that the government will not limit the number of providers, the number of
students they may enrol, the legal form of new entrants or limit the level of
foreign ownership. The real issues here will be the government’s ability
respond equally to demands under National Treatment for financial support in
terms of boarding grants, student loans or any other financial support i.e.
subsidies for students attending local or foreign (i.e. Consumption Abroad),
public or private colleges and universities. So a student at Florida
International, or UT Jamaica or indeed any of the three UWI campuses (Jamaica,
Trinidad, Barbados) may require and expect parity of financial support.
Otherwise, the practical effect would be a non-level playing field in favour of
local providers. Where services are unbound in Mode 4 it means that service
providers, local or foreign can be limited by needs tests or quotas. However
the implications of the Most Favored Nation (MFN) principle that is a
fundamental commitment for all members could be tested in relation to these
cases.
The commitments
made by Jamaica on joining the WTO were not particularly at odds with the then
current situation. What was different were the long term implications of their
formalisation within the GATS system. NACE has recommended “a holistic
assessment of GATS on all levels of the education sector with a view to
determine the socio-cultural implications of a liberalized system” (NACE, 2004
p.26). Nor was or is there any significant difference from regional norms.
Williams 2004 is quoted in the RNM Report as saying that there are over 150
institutions (in the Caribbean) of which 60% are public, 30% private and the
remaining 10% exist with some government support’. All present and future
institutions are tools in the drive to increase the enrolment of post secondary
cohorts in tertiary level institutions that must be a strategic imperative in
the development of the region. Regional governments would be hard-pressed if
forced to apply the GATS rules regarding Market Access and National Treatment
across the board. However the vulnerability of developing countries is
highlighted by reference to the comment of the Australian Department of Foreign
Trade as quoted in Zigoura, McBurnie and Reinke (2003): “Australian commitments
entered in during the Uruguay Round were structured so that we have the ability
to discriminate between foreign and domestic private institutions (e.g. in
relation to subsidies), should this ever be an issue”.
The local
tertiary sector understandably has concerns about quality and accreditation
issues. They are concerned about inferior and irrelevant programmes being
offered by providers for whom the profit motive is paramount. Comments have
been made that foreign providers focus on areas where the necessary
infrastructure and staffing is minimal and leave local providers i.e.
governments to finance the more expensive and less immediately popular areas.
For example setting up arrangements for short business courses or computer
courses is cheaper and easier than dealing with laboratory sciences. According
to the RNM Report “[except for Jamaica] compared to developed countries,
CARICOM member states have only recently started to establish the regulatory
and infrastructural framework for the accreditation and quality assurance of
the tertiary education sector.” (p.8)
There are
several existing and planned linkages between UWI and other universities in the
member states of CARICOM and the recently instituted Caribbean Single Market
and Economy (CSME). The Caribbean Knowledge and Learning Network (CKLN) is
expected to provide the infrastructure to support e-learning. CARICOM is
committed to funding and supporting the development of the regional UWI and
national TLI’s since it is recognized that these are best suited for and have
an intrinsic commitment to local societal interests and culture. However if
these are burdened by the responsibility of providing the costliest programmes
against competition from private, for- profit institutions with comparatively vast
resources and budgets their task is almost impossible. For instance, with the
foreign private sector able to attract quality staff with higher wages and
conditions of service there is the risk under- staffing and under-resourcing
public institutions which will reduce quality and destroy reputations and
public confidence as has happened in some Asian jurisdictions. Then, education
and consequently the society will be even more stratified. The competitive
strength afforded to private-for- profit TLI by their capacity to offer
flexible programmes especially to the adult working population boosted by
strength in ICTs which facilitate reduced student costs and increased profits
should not be underestimated. ICTs have been the drivers of the growth of cross-border
tertiary education and training over the Internet.
UWI
itself has a number of extra-regional linkages with other universities.
These facilitate student exchanges with universities in Japan, Suriname,
Canada, the UK, and the USA. At both ends students are required to pay the full
fees of the institutions. Of course, fees at UWI, which, at present, makes no
distinction between regional and extra-regional origin are much cheaper.
Consequently the University may lobby for scholarships and parents may arrange
loans, but these are always on an individual basis.
Besides its on-campus
offerings, UWI also has a Distance Education Programme (UWIDEC) and which
delivers courses to the non-campus territories. There has been considerable
investment in this to upgrade and expand especially in the area of computer
technology and telecommunications infrastructure. The Caribbean Examination
Council (CXC) provides testing services throughout the region. Its viability is
dependent on its market. They are therefore vulnerable to competition in
particular from distance education and testing services in the USA especially
since these are backed by the attraction of the US colleges whose requirements
they have years of experience of satisfying. Another fear expressed is concern
less the commitments enable Jamaica to be used as an insertion point for
foreign educational materials to be allowed into the region.
Summary
Commitments made under the
GATS involves a country in a web of complex rules and punitive measures even
when the government is instituting measures to ensure its citizens equitable
access to quality education as a necessary pre-requisite for development. The
Jamaican experience is a cautionary tale for developing countries.
The Trinidad and Tobago Experience
Trinidad and Tobago is a
twin-island republic, is also part of the Commonwealth Caribbean It has a
population of over 1.3 million people in an area of 5128 km2 (World
Bank,2005). Like Jamaica and Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago has been a member of
the Caribbean Community and Common Market (Caricom) since 1973 and of the
Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME) that was formalised in 2006.
Trinidad joined the WTO in 1995. It has commitments in education under the
General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). These are tabled in the
sub-sectors Adult and Other with full commitments (“none”) in Modes 1 and 2,
unbound in Mode 3, and Limitations in Mode 4 (see Appendix).
Full commitments mean
complete liberalisation, whilst in the unbound mode the government reserves the
right to impose limitations in the future. The limitations in Mode 4, the
Movement of Natural Persons, in this case lecturers and specialist teachers,
refer to Immigration laws and regulations relating to certification,
registration and licensing.
Like other Caribbean
countries, the Trinidad & Tobago government has pursued as a goal the
development of a well educated and trained labour force which might act as an
incentive for foreign direct investment towards the social and economic
development of the country. The education system is based on the British model.
Public education at both the primary and secondary level is free. There is now
universal access to secondary education. The Secondary Entrance Examination is
used as a filtering process to allocate students. From kindergarten to
post-secondary there are a number of private education institutions that cater
for a range of social and economic statuses. Government or government-assisted
secondary schools are generally considered to be of a higher standard than
purely private secondary schools although all prepare students for the
Caribbean Examination Council Examinations. There are two international schools
in Port of Spain with curricula based respectively on the Canadian and USA
systems.
There are also a number of
tertiary level institutions in the country, including Government Technical
Colleges and the Trinidad and Tobago Institute of Technology (which offers
certificate and degree programmes based on the North American Technology
Institute model). There is a government Institute of Languages and the French
and Venezuelan embassies support language schools as they do in other islands.
Continuing education programmes are available at a number of
institutions. The University of the West Indies has a campus at St.
Augustine (others are at Mona in Jamaica and at Cave Hill in Barbados) with a
Faculty of Agriculture (now the Eastern Caribbean Institute of Agriculture and
Forestry, ECIAF), a Faculty of Engineering, a College of Arts and Science and an
active Extra Mural Department which provides evening classes, summer seminars
and lectures for adults. The University of the West Indies School of Continuing
Studies offers courses in a number of areas both academic and non-academic. The
former Caribbean Union College now the University of the Southern Caribbean is
another tertiary institution.
The government spends
annually about 4.3% of GDP on education with largest allocation for tertiary
education. The government aims to have a 20% tertiary enrolment by 2010 and
pays full fees for Bachelor Degrees and 50% for Masters including up to 50% or
a maximum of TT $5000 at accredited private institutions. There has been
a significant increase in public-private partnership for education in Trinidad
and Tobago. For example British Petroleum has recently made a US $10 million
dollar investment in the government’s University of Trinidad & Tobago.
According to its Group Chief Executive, Lord Browne of Madingley, Group Chief
Executive (2005): “An open and meritocratic education system is fundamental to
establishing the standards of society – promoting and rewarding individual
effort and commitment. It is the key to unleashing creativity, for which this
country is famous, and the key to accessing the full potential of your people
... I also believe that we should make a leading contribution to support the
development of the new University of Trinidad & Tobago and, in particular,
to support the planned development of high-quality research in science and
technology.”
The investment takes a
number of forms: Brighter Prospects, the bpTT (British Petroleum Trinidad &
Tobago) Scholarship Award programme for Mayaro district, provides scholarships
to students who possess the ability to pursue academic and technical/vocational
training, for those who may lack the means to do so. It creates
incentives for students from pre-school to primary, through to secondary and on
to tertiary and technical/vocational training. bpTT has partnered several
educational institutions including the University of the West Indies and the
Trinidad & Tobago Institute of Technology under this programme. The
programme also provides for new entrepreneurs in the community, who qualify, to
access the facilities offered in the Mayaro Initiative and Private Enterprise
Development.
A partnership between bpTT
and the Geological Society of Trinidad & Tobago made the bold and
progressive step to develop an accredited Petroleum Geoscience programme at the
University of the West Indies. Members of bpTT’s staff have lectured full
semester courses, served as guest lecturers in specialized areas and also
coached and mentored students during summer internships and final year
projects.
bpTT provides 10 bursaries
annually with a total value of TT$100,000 to students attending the University
of the West Indies. These bursaries are awarded in the disciplines of
Engineering and the Social Sciences.
bpTT partnered the British
High Commission and the British Council to award scholarships to potential
young local leaders and decision-makers for study in countries with established
economic relations with the United Kingdom. Preference for this scholarship is
usually given to nationals already established in a career within Trinidad and
Tobago.
bpTT also supports the
Fulbright Scholarship Programme and has sponsored one Fulbright scholar per
year over the last four years.
Other bpTT educational
initiatives include:
-
Internships
-
Math Olympiad
-
Lectures by BP experts
-
Mentorship programmes with secondary and tertiary level institutions
-
Schools Energy Education (SEE) programme
-
Primary and secondary schools educational programmes
-
Secondary Entrance Assessment (SEA) Awards to the top 100 students in Trinidad and
Tobago.
Besides these opportunities
for tertiary education, there is anew programme, H.E.L.P (Higher Education Loan
Programme)., which provides access to funding. The loans incur a small interest
repayable on completion of study and beginning of employment.
All of this is in keeping
with Prime Minister Patrick Manning’s mandate for his country to develop the
infrastructure to promote advances in health and education as part of of his
plan “Vision 2020” to move forward the country’s economy. Hence, the University
of Trinidad and Tobago (UTT) was founded in 2004 through a partnership of the
government, the private sector and the national community. UTT is a
not-for-profit entrepreneurial university that the government has directed to
take a leading role in developing state-of-the-art tertiary education and
research. Then, in 2005 the Trinidad and Tobago Health Sciences Initiative
(TTHSI) was formed to advance the health sciences and education sectors through
the establishment of a long-term strategic collaboration between University of
Trinidad and Tobago, Johns Hopkins Medicine International, the Trinidad
Ministry of Health and the Trinidad and Tobago Ministry of Science, Technology
and Tertiary Education. This unique, three-pronged collaboration in
consulting, educational and advisory services is destined to exceed other Johns
Hopkins Medicine International's global partnerships. To successfully implement
a project of this scope and size, Johns Hopkins Medicine International brought
together Johns Hopkins experts in medicine, public health, public policy and
management to advise, train and manage the range of services. Some activities
resulting from this initiative include the planning and evaluation for
development and expansion of clinical health facilities, public health
education programs, clinical research and herbal research programs.
Summary
The Trinidad & Tobago
has identified the areas in which it can best profit by liberalisation but has
retained the options to impose and maintain regulation. This has enabled it to
handle the pressure for education provisions and manipulate the available FDI
largely on its own terms.
The Barbados Experience
“Barbados has already made a commitment to
liberalise all of its sectors within the creation of the Single Market and
Economy. Restrictions will continue to apply in those areas reserved by the
Crown and those that amount to non-discriminatory regulation.” Barbados
Ministry of Economic Development re Trade in Services (2002).
“One of the basic benefits
of liberalisation in services is that it increases the variety and amount of
education services available to WTO members. These are vital to all countries,
including the emerging economies, which are in need of technology-savvy,
well-trained workforces that are able to compete in the global economy. This
acts as a spur to foreign investment and further transfer of important
technologies. The growth of education services also raises demand for a wide
range of important technologies. The growth of education services also raises a
demand for arrange of related goods and services, including production and sale
of educational and training material an equipment.”
The above is taken from a
brief on Educational Services prepared by the Barbados Ministry of Economic Development
for Consultations in June 2002 with a number of education stakeholders
including the Ministry of Education, education unions, and the University of
the West Indies (Cave Hill campus) and. The document talks about the crucial
role of education in fostering economic growth, personal and social development
and reducing inequality by providing skills to facilitate effective
participation in the workforce that is, reducing unemployment.
Barbados is a small island
of the Commonwealth Caribbean, heavily populated with about 260 thousand people
in an area of 431 km2. Like Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago Barbados
has been a member of the Caribbean Community and Common Market (Caricom) since
2003 and has been a prime mover in the formation of the Caribbean Single Market
and Economy (CSME) that was formalised in January 2006. Barbados became a
member of the WTO in 1995. It has no commitments in education under the General
Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS).
As in many countries,
Barbadian governments have based their education planning on a national
presumption that education is a public good or, as the brief puts it, ‘a
“public consumption” item’ to be provided free or ‘at prices not reflecting the
costs of producing it’. Education has traditionally been mainly
government funded and since 1960 not only primary but secondary education has
been free in government schools. There is a system of government assisting
secondary schools with grants to cover salaries of some teachers particularly
in the sciences, subventions to include specialised subjects in the curriculum
and bursaries to assist some students. In government-approved secondary
schools, students get books under a Textbook Loan Scheme with a small fee to
cover administrative expenses. At the tertiary level the economic cost of
Barbadian students at the University of the West Indies is paid for a first
degree and post –graduate studies may be supported. Scholarships are awarded
annually to the best students at Advanced Level -Caribbean Advanced Proficiency
Examinations under the aegis of the Caribbean Examinations Council or the
Barbados Community College Associate Degree examinations. These Scholarships
can be used to study in approved areas at overseas universities and most
students go to the UK, Canada or the USA. Exhibitions are also awarded annually
for study at the University of the West Indies. There are also Government
funded Student Loans available. Annual Education expenditure is about 18% of
the budget allocation 8% of GDP: post secondary /tertiary education is about
one-quarter of the education budget and for 200/01 was estimated to be US$45
million up from US$24milion in 1990/91. Given the public- private mix of
education finance for students or institutions, it is possible that under rules
of the GATS, education services may be deemed as not entirely supplied in the “
exercise of governmental authority (neither on a commercial basis nor in
competition)” (GATS), and be considered as subsidies with respect to GATS
rules. The Barbados Community College and the Samuel Jackman Prescod
Polytechnic for example, although essentially government institutions have some
sections which may be defined as functioning on a profit-making basis which
would bring the institutions under the GATS rules for national treatment i.e.
not totally financed by government but in competition with private providers.
This is also true for primary and secondary schools and post-secondary training
institutions.
There are no Overseas
Colleges in Barbados but a number of institutions offer courses and tests under
franchising arrangements with overseas institutions mostly from the UK. There
are an increasing number of students who are doing post –graduate studies using
Information Communications Technology for distance education. The Cave Hill
campus for UWI is heavily involved in the UWIDEC programme by which courses are
offered to students in the non-campus territories. The Barbados Community
College has also franchised some of its programmes to other islands and also
facilitates the examinations of overseas universities. Particularly at the
Tertiary level there are a number of proposals for changes in the education
system that might be affected by the GATS rules. For example, the Barbados
Community College has just expanded its offerings in language education with
the aid of EU funds; the Barbados Government plans to merge the Community
College, the Polytechnic and Erdiston Teacher Training College into a
University College of Barbados. At the stakeholder meeting on services it was
the perceptive warning of a senior civil servant with considerable experience
both internationally and in the education sector which really alerted the group
to the potential danger of commitment of the education sector to the GATS.
Liberalisation of education services may be detrimental to the success of this
project.
Barbadian teachers and
educational institutions at all levels have been very involved in regional
activities. There has been a considerable increase in activities closely
related to education and supportive of the systems and processes of education
directed towards national and regional development. These include testing
services, services for students locally and regionally in exchange programmes
and the expansion of ICT systems to support a growing demand for diverse
training and adult and other education services. Curricula which take into
account local and regional culture are considered important in maintaining a
cultural and national identity. However there is a relatively limited market
and it would be difficult to support several of these services in an open
market. Some government subsidisation is essential to maintain equitable
opportunities and reduce stratification and social divisions and the National
Treatment regimes of the GATS could impose impossible financial burdens. On the
other hand some local and regional educational services are marketable outside
the region.
Summary
The advice contained in the
Regional Negotiating Machinery (RNM) Report on “International Supply of Tertiary
Education and Services Trade Negotiations: Implications for Caricom” (2004) is
important. It is very easy to be seduced in thinking that the GATS rules are
reasonable and user friendly and offer opportunities for developing countries
to access much needed Foreign Direct investment to improve education provisions
towards national and regional strategic developmental goals. However the
long-term implications of MFN and National Treatment and Market Access
regulations and the impact of commitment to liberalisation on strategies
governments employ to protect and encourage home industries and service
providers. There is also the important fact that mutual recognition agreements
and reciprocity are not imbedded in the GATS. This means that issues related to
professional services such as immigration laws and accreditation processes
should be scrutinised. Any government seeking to ensure that post-secondary
education serves its community’s goals and aspirations must analyse the
restrictions or limitations trade liberalisation imposes.
To date Barbados has made
no commitments with respect to educational services relating to the four modes
of supply. This has enabled it to maintain maximum flexibility in planning and
implementing its own trade liberalisation programme in a sensitive area without
fear of charges and penalties.
References and/or complementary bibliography
Barbados Ministry of
Education, Youth Affairs and Sports (2001) Education in Barbados Information
Handbook
Barbados Ministry of
Education, Youth Affairs and Sports (2002) Economic And Social Report 2001
Task Force on National
Reform (2004) JAMAICA: A TRANSFORMED EDUCATION SYSTEM – Final Report, Kingston
Jamaica
The University of the West
Indies Strategic Committee (2003) Strategic Plan II 2002-2007 UWI Mona, Jamaica
Appendices
I. The WTO and GATS
The General Agreement on
Trade in Services is a multilateral legally enforceable agreement covering
international trade in services and is administered by the World Trade
Organisation has 149 member countries. The GATS focuses exclusively on trade in
services. , Services being defined as service in any sector except
(Article 1.3b) services engaged upon “in the exercise of Governmental
Authority”. The GATS agreement defines “a service supplied in the exercise of
governmental authority” as any service that is supplied neither on a
commercial basis nor in competition with one or more service suppliers
(Article 1.3c). Educational Services is listed amongst the 12
service sectors covered by the agreement. The education sector is further
subdivided into five sub-sectors: primary, secondary, tertiary, adult and
‘other’ education services.
Trade in Services is
defined in the GATS by identifying 4 supply modes:
Mode 1 – Cross-Border
supply – “from the territory of one Member into the territory of any other
Member” i.e. the service travels (as a good might), producers and consumers
remain at home and communicate by post, fax, and the Internet.
Examples: transnational
distance education, virtual education institutions (like Phoenix University),
Education software, ICT
delivered corporate training.
Mode 2 - Consumption abroad
– supply “in the territory of one Member to the service consumer of any other
Member” i.e. the consumer travels to the country of the service supply. This is
comparable to tourism or business travel: students travel to study (and live)
in another country.
Mode 3 - Commercial presence
- supply “by a service supplier of one Member, through commercial presence in
the territory of another Member” i.e. foreign direct investment (FDI)
Transnational education,
possibly involving local partnerships: locally established universities or satellite/branch
campuses, language training companies, private training companies
Mode 4 –Movement of natural
persons – supplies “by a service supplier of one member, through presence of
natural persons of a Member in the territory of any other Member”. This is
comparable to temporary emigration or business travel by the service provider.
Examples: teachers,
researchers, lecturers working abroad on a temporary basis.
Becoming a Member of WTO
involves two types of commitments:
General Obligations for
Most Favored Nation Treatment (MFN) and Transparency apply automatically
Specific
Commitments where Members can
decide and negotiate the extent to which a service sector is covered under GATS
rules. They refer to a government’s undertaking to provide Market Access
and National Treatment for a service activity on the terms and conditions
specified in the schedule. The entries on a Member’s schedule of specific
commitments are legally binding.
Specific commitments are
either: Horizontal – applying to all sectors on the Member’s list of
commitments usually with respect to modes of supply often 3 and 4.
It refers to describing the
level of commitment of a specific sector as: NONE where the Member imposes no
limitation on Market Access or National Treatment or BOUND unless otherwise
specified. Then, if the Member wants to be free to introduce or maintain
regulatory measures inconsistent with Market Access and National Treatment, the
Member indicates ‘UNBOUND’.
TABLE 1: MODES
OF SUPPLY OF EDUCATION SERVICES
|
Mode of Supply According to GATS |
GATS Definition + Explanation |
Examples in Education |
Size, Potential of market And major advantages/ impediments |
Caribbean concerns |
|
Cross-border supply |
The supply of a service “ from the territory of
one member into the territory of any other Member” – The service travels, both provider (exporter)
and consumer (importer) remain home, c.f. the export of a good e.g. banking, data processing, legal or
architectural services, tele-medical consultations |
Distance education E-learning Virtual education institutions e.g. Phoenix U Education software Corporate training through ICT delivery |
Currently relatively small
but rapidly growing
market Seen to have much potential through the use of
ICT’s and the Internet Cheaper since infrastructural requirements
are smaller Speedy delivery |
Accreditation Quality assurance Content re local curricula and culture Acculturation Competition for local services |
|
Consumption Abroad |
The supply of a service “in the territory of
one member to the service consumer of any other Member” – c.f. tourism, health care, ship or aircraft
maintenance or business travel by the consumer or |
Students travel to other countries to do courses
of study/degree programmes |
Currently represents the largest share of the
global market for education services especially in post-secondary education. N.B. GATS commitments are of little
significance given general lack of restrictions and relative to non-GATS
issues such as student visas and funding. GATS may help re greater recognition of
degrees by home-country institutions |
Cost Encouragement of brain/skill drain Impact on aid/scholarship provisions Future remittances from migrants |
|
Mode of Supply According to GATS |
GATS Definition + Explanation |
Examples in Education |
Size, Potential of market And major advantages/ impediments |
Caribbean concerns |
|
Commercial Presence |
The supply of a service “by a service supplier
of one member, through the commercial presence in the territory of any other
Member” – i.e. foreign direct investment (FDI) e.g.
into hotel or manufacturing industries, banking, insurance, health clinics |
Overseas schools/ colleges/universities (OVC’s) Language training companies Private training companies e.g. Fujisutsu, Twinning partnerships, franchising
arrangements with local institutions Examination and testing services |
-Growing interest and strong potential for future
growth. But there is significant reluctance to make binding commitments: Few
WTO members have made full commitments for HE under this mode. |
Cost – finance leakage but also savings on
living and travel expenses Accreditation Quality assurance Competition – difficulties in building
indigenous institutions Competition for staff Loss of quality and staus for local
institutions Curriculum, culture access and equity issues extension of government subsidies Issues re national treatment Technology transfer Efficiency transfer Increased commercialisation |
|
Mode of Supply According to GATS |
GATS Definition + Explanation |
Examples in Education |
Size, Potential of market And major advantages/ impediments |
Caribbean concerns |
|
Movement of Natural
Persons |
The supply of a
service “by a service supplier of one Member,
through presence of natural persons of a Member in the territory of any other
Member” - c.f. temporary emigration or business travel
by the service supplier e.g. nurses, doctors, consulting
engineers/lawyers/account-ants |
Teachers, lecturers, researchers working
abroad on a temporary basis |
Potentially a strong market given the
emphasis on/increasing demands for the mobility of highly skilled professionals. Generally more politically sensitive than
other modes Generally less commercially significant than
other modes Most WTO members maintain horizontal
commitments (e.g. immigration rules applying to all service sectors) Academics encounter little difficulty-
mobility is demand driven; special skills |
Although the GATS agreement is quite specific
that this relates only to temporary movement, this inevitably favours the
migration of skilled professionals to countries where pay and conditions are superior.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
TABLE 3: Expenditure per student in US$ for
2000
|
Country |
Primary |
Secondary |
Tertiary |
GDP per
capita |
Literacy Rate |
|
Jamaica |
323 |
500 |
1703 |
3,561 |
86.4 |
|
Trinidad
& Tobago |
816 |
734 |
N/A |
8,176 |
93.5 |
|
Barbados |
1871 |
2432 |
5634 |
14,553 |
97.0 |
|
Source:
(Jamaica National Council on Education,2004) |
|||||
The Evolution of Science
Curricula in Developing Countries
and the Issue of Relevance
University of
the West Indies, Trinidad
& Tobago
junemgeorge@yahoo.com or jgeorge@fhe.uwi.tt
Introduction
Many developing countries
today are ex-colonies of super powers and there are some countries that are
still under colonial rule. Colonial dominance by superpowers such as France,
Great Britain, Germany, and the United States of America (USA) can be detected
in the nature and functioning of the education system in several developing
countries. In the post-independence period there have been some attempts by
developing countries to reshape the school curriculum to meet local needs and
conditions. For example, in the 1980s, Nigeria changed the structure of its
school system from the British model to a 3-year Junior Secondary and a 3-year
Senior Secondary system. In Mozambique, the post-colonial government moved to
replace the test-centred Portuguese system with a less authoritarian system. In
Mali, adjustments were made to the structure of the school calendar to cater
for the fact that school children were involved in the rural economy (Woolman,
2001). In addition, particularly in post-independent African countries, there
has been some focus on producing science curricula that are vocationally
relevant (Lewin, 1992). Despite these efforts, though, the problem of
re-designing an education system to cater for specific local economic and
cultural issues still persists. In this paper, the focus is on the continuing
influence of colonial systems of education on science education in developing
countries. It is argued that the onus is on local science educators to ensure
that the distinctive characteristics of the local setting are catered for in
the school science curriculum so that students would come to see the relevance of
science to their personal life, their immediate community, and the national
community.
The Evolution of Science Curricula in
Developing Countries
Great Britain provides a
good example of how a mother country influenced the education system in the
developing world. At some point in history, Britain colonized places such as
India, several countries in the Caribbean, several countries in Africa, Cyprus,
Hong Kong, and so on. The education system that it introduced in these colonies
was designed to meet its own needs, including the provision of educational
opportunities for the children of British personnel working in the colonies,
and the education of clerks to ensure the smooth running of its overseas
operations. When the British first introduced science into the education system
in the colonies, it sometimes took the form of agricultural education as that
was an area of immediate concern. Over time, the separate science subjects of
biology, chemistry, and physics were introduced. The impact of the British influence
is perhaps more readily appreciated through a consideration of the nature of
the examinations that Britain introduced to the colonies. These examinations
were set by British Examination Boards, notably those run by the Universities
of London, and Cambridge, and were designed to determine the achievement level
of students after five years and seven years of secondary schooling
respectively, that is, of students in the fifth and sixth forms of secondary
schools.
By the 1950s, secondary
education in Britain was selective. The syllabi for the then national
examinations for fifth and sixth form students, termed the General Certificate
of Education Ordinary level (GCE O-level) and Advanced level (GCE A-level)
examinations respectively, served to prepare students for the intense
competition of gaining university places in science. The science curriculum was
traditional, with conventional topics such as Electricity and magnetism;
Heat, light and sound; and so on. The examination placed strong emphasis on
the recall of factual information and the solving of routine problems. The
questions were typically traditional and the overall tone of the examination
was positivistic. The science curriculum at the lower end of the secondary
school at that time was diverse since there were no national examinations at
this level (Jenkins, 2004, pp.33-34). This scenario was mirrored in many of the
British colonies at that time. Secondary education was available only to a
select few and the secondary school curriculum, including that for science, was
patterned after the British model. Students in the colonies also sat GCE
O-level and A-level examinations.
As the colonies gained
independence, beginning around the 1960s, new developments in education began
to take place. Strikingly, some of these developments occurred at the lower
secondary level and they were also influenced by developments in Britain
itself. For example, in the period 1968-1969, the West Indies Science
Curriculum Innovation Project (WISCIP) was developed for use in the lower
secondary sector in Trinidad and Tobago to meet the needs of students in the
soon-to-be- established junior secondary schools. This curriculum, designed
mainly by teachers in existing grammar-type schools, drew on recommendations
contained in Curriculum Paper No. 7: Science in General Education, which guided the development of the Scottish
Integrated Science Curriculum (Reay, n.d.) The Scottish Integrated Science
Curriculum, in turn, influenced science curricula in places such as Hong Kong,
Malaysia, and Nigeria. WISCIP itself influenced the development of science
curricula in Swaziland.
This move towards the
teaching of integrated science in Britain was innovative in more than one way.
Science was to be taught in an integrated fashion, with no specific focus on
any one of the separate sciences. In addition, the new integrated science
curricula broadened the scope of the science curriculum to include overarching
themes such as “science for citizenship,” “science for the enquiring mind,” and
“science for action.” Teachers in developing countries who were required to
deliver this type of curriculum faced several challenges. Many of them had been
trained in one or two of the separate science subjects only and typically from
very positivistic perspectives. What has evolved over the years is that,
although the term “integrated science” is still used to describe the offering
at the lower secondary level, what is often offered is a programme that has
elements of physics, chemistry and biology (and possibly earth science), with
biology constituting the largest component. One explanation for this
distribution of subject matter is that more lower secondary science teachers in
developing countries are likely to have been trained in biology than in any
other science discipline.
In the mid sixties, there
were also winds of change at the upper secondary level in Britain. In 1965, the
Certificate of Secondary Education (CSE) was introduced for fifth form
students, primarily to facilitate students in the newly established modern
secondary schools. These schools catered for students at the lower end of the
ability range and the format of the examinations allowed for a considerable
amount of teacher input through the design of syllabi and assessment of student
learning through project work and oral presentations. In the early 1970s, The
Nuffield Foundation of the United Kingdom donated a large sum of money for use
in school science and mathematics curriculum reform, with an emphasis on
investigative work in science. This had a domino effect on the organization and
delivery of the science curriculum generally, and eventually led to the
revision of the GCE O-level and A-level syllabi. By the 1980s, the CSE had been
incorporated into the GCE examinations in the creation of the General
Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) programme. One hallmark of the
scoring of GCSE examinations is that it is criterion-referenced as opposed to
the norm-referenced nature of the GCE examinations (Jenkins, 2004).
Even before the creation of
the GCSE, winds of change were also blowing in the Commonwealth Caribbean. The
Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) was established in 1972 by an agreement
among 15 English speaking Commonwealth Caribbean countries. It offered its
first set of examinations for fifth form students in 1979 and integrated
science was the only science offering. Fifth form students continued to write
the Cambridge GCE O-level examinations in biology, chemistry and physics, until
1985 when the first CXC examinations in these subjects were offered. From its
inception, CXC examinations, including those in science, have had a strong
school-based component. In 1999, CXC began
offering examinations equivalent to the GCE A-level examinations. Examination
Boards such as the West Africa Examinations Council, Nigeria Examinations
Council, Matriculation and the Secondary Education Certificate Examinations
Board of Malta, were established in other former colonies to replace the GCE
system of examinations. One goal of these examination bodies is to produce
examinations of a high standard that are more relevant to the local context
than the GCE examinations.
Science education reform
activity was also taking place at the primary level, but at a later date. The
impetus for some of this work in developing countries was provided by
developments in the 1960s in both the UK and the USA. Harlen (1987) outlines
that three primary science projects in the USA (Elementary Science Study,
the Science Curriculum Improvement Study, and Science – A Process Approach),
as well as three projects in the UK (the Oxford Science Project, the
Nuffield Junior Science Project and Science 5-13) greatly influenced
the development of primary science curricula in former colonies such as
Nigeria, India and New Zealand, beginning in the 1970s. Decades later, the
influence of American and British primary science curricula is still prominent
in countries such as Cyprus (Zembylas, 2002). Developing countries have had to
struggle with issues such as the role of science process skills in primary
science education – issues which originated in the materials from the developed
countries and which the developed countries were able to sort through much more
efficiently. The net result is that years after the heavy reliance on science process
skills was abandoned in the USA, the focus was still prominent in primary
science curricula in some developing countries.
What Science? The Issue of Relevance
During colonial times, the
local context into which these science curricula from developed countries were
being imported was seldom ever considered. As mentioned above, some attempt has
been made in some countries in the post-colonial period to shape education to
fit local needs. This is an on-going struggle as several obstacles are faced. There
are economic and human resource factors that impact on any such attempts. There
must be the appropriate human resource base and sufficient funding to change
curricula that have existed over years, and which carry a certain amount of
prestige because of their association with the developed world. There must also
be a desire to change. Opposition to change comes from many quarters, including
school personnel and, most significantly, parents. Some of those in positions
of power are likely to have been educated in the colonial mode and may find it
difficult to understand why that which has “worked” in the past should be
changed. Furthermore, it is sometimes argued that we live in a global society
and our students should be prepared to function in a global world by following
curricula that are similar to those followed in developed countries.
These kinds of issues lead
us to take a consideration of the question of relevance of the curriculum.
Aikenhead (2006) cautions us that there is some ambiguity in meaning associated
with the term “relevance.” The questions “relevant for whom?” and “relevant for
what?” are often asked. In the context of developing countries, with their push
toward economic development, the tendency is often to focus on producing
science graduates at the secondary school level who can pursue further studies
in science and technology at tertiary institutions to augment the country’s
human resource capacity in this area. The fear in developing countries is that,
in the absence of a pool of citizens qualified in the areas of science and
technology, they would be “left behind” in this era of globalization. Such
thinking reflects a focus on science curricula that are relevant to the needs
of the country. This is a legitimate concern that cannot be ignored. However,
what is often not discussed is that in order to have students who are motivated
enough to study science through the secondary level to the tertiary sector, we
must cater for the needs of those students so that their interest in the subject
would be piqued and so that they would be more inclined to see the study of
science as serving not only the country’s needs, but also their needs as well.
The personal needs of science students in developing countries need to be
brought centre stage.
From a review of research
studies on the relevance of science, Van Aalsvoort (2004) provides a three-part
categorization of relevance that clearly focuses on the student – personal
relevance, professional relevance, and social relevance. Personal relevance is
achieved when education in science “makes connections with pupils’ lives” (p.
1152). Science education is said to have professional relevance when it leads
students to see how their studies can result in possible membership in various
professions. Thirdly, Van Aalsvoort suggests that science education that has
social relevance will help students to clarify human and social issues. This
classification provides a useful scheme for considering the relevance of
science curricula in developing countries. This is not to suggest that one
should only consider the welfare of the student when planning the science
curriculum. However, it is necessary to meet the needs of students even as
attempts are made to meet other legitimate needs.
The connection that the
science curriculum can make with students’ lives is not a straightforward issue
as students in developing countries are sometimes exposed to a mix of
influences – those that have emerged out of the local culture, and those that
have been more recently imported from industrialised settings, particularly the
USA. So, for example, some students in developing countries (even some in rural
areas) have access to the latest technological devices including the computer
and the internet, videogames, MP3 players, cell phones, and so on. A science
curriculum with personal relevance for such students might involve the use of
some of the technology in the teaching/learning process, the study of the
functioning of some of the devices, and the study of the impact that they have on
society. Often, this is the approach that is taken in developing countries in
the quest for more relevant science curricula (for example, the Integrated
Science curriculum of the Caribbean Examinations Council). While this general
approach serves a need, it does not deal with the whole spectrum of students’
lives. A missing component is the portion of the students’ lives that is
governed by those traditional practices and beliefs that have been generated in
their community over many years and which are typically passed on orally from
one generation to the next. Three likely areas of influence of such beliefs and
practices are discussed here.
It is a well-known maxim
that children do not come to the classroom with empty minds. They bring with
them a lot that they have learnt prior to formal instruction. Even though
children in developing countries may not have learnt formal science before
entering the science classroom, they bring with them ideas about content areas
that are covered in the formal school curriculum. For example, they would have
learnt (and will continue to learn) traditional practices and beliefs
pertaining to health care, food preparation, agricultural practices, the care
of infants, and so on. Sometimes, such traditional knowledge can be explained
by conventional science, but many times, it bears no relationship to
conventional science (for a fuller account, see for example, George, 1995;
George & Glasgow, 1988, 1999). If science as taught in schools is to have
personal relevance to students, then it is essential that connections be made
between the school science and the traditional knowledge that students may draw
on in their daily lives. If this is not done, then students are likely to
practise “cognitive apartheid” (Cobern, 1996) by keeping their everyday
knowledge completely isolated from the school science knowledge and resorting
to school science only when they need to as, for example, when they have to
write school examinations.
Secondly, in addition to
ideas about content areas covered in school science, students in developing
countries bring to the science class their own basic assumptions of how the
world functions (their worldview) that may not be in accord with the
science-related worldview. For example, the desire to exploit and manipulate
nature has been a characteristic of conventional science for some time. This
orientation has been fuelled by technological advancements over the years.
Although there is some concern now in conventional science circles about the
degradation of the environment, there is still much evidence of exploitation.
In contrast, in some developing countries, there exists the view that nature
provides everything that one needs for one’s survival and it must be treated
with respect. Consequently, one should manage one’s interaction with nature in
order to reap maximum benefits (George, 1999). A science curriculum that has
personal relevance for students would make connections to students’ worldview
and would encourage discussions about the similarities and differences between
what students bring to the classroom and what school science has to offer.
Thirdly, there is the arena
of communication. In science, there are very formal mechanisms for
communicating and, typically, some of these are transmitted in the school
science curriculum. This mode of communicating is likely to be at variance with
the ways in which students in developing countries communicate in their
everyday lives. Such students often recount their experiences by telling
stories. Indeed, they would have learnt much of the traditional knowledge in
their community through stories. But, there are usually no stories in science
classes (even though there are some great stories in the history of science)
and, further, the story-telling mode is not considered acceptable in formal
communication in science. Then, there is the question of how one structures
one’s argument. Explanations in conventional science rely heavily on formal
logic. On the other hand, claims made in everyday conversations in a developing
country context are likely to be supported by warrants consisting of personal
experiences and the authority of elders (George, 1995). Another communication
issue is likely to be the difference in the language used in formal science
instruction vis-à-vis everyday life. To what extent is language a barrier to
students in developing countries in their attempt to understand the scientific
concepts and principles that are taught to them? To what extent is traditional
knowledge being eroded because the language of instruction in schools is
different from the everyday language of the owners of the traditional
knowledge? McKinley (2005) advocates that for the survival of traditional
ecological knowledge, programmes should be taught through indigenous languages
so that the dialectal relationship between language and traditional knowledge
is maintained. In an era of globalization where official government policy is
likely to be towards mastery of globally used languages, this may be seen as a
difficult proposition. Yet, the fact remains that if efforts are not made to
tackle issues of communication in the science class, school science may be
lacking in personal relevance for students in developing countries.
Although the discourse
above has focused on students in developing countries, some of it may also
apply to students in industrialised settings who may be operating outside of a
science-related world view.
Science curricula in
developing countries typically do not meet the criterion of personal relevance
with a cultural slant as described above. Although there have been many
projects aimed at making the science curriculum more relevant to the local
context, the cultural context of the learner has hardly been considered. Given
that many of these science curricula in developing countries often started off
as some variation of the colonial ones, it is not difficult to see that there
was no pattern of cultural integration that was there to be used as the
template. This presents science educators in developing countries with the
unique opportunity to invent and create, but this seldom happens. The really
large-scale science curriculum projects that focus on the local culture are to
be found in developed countries such as Canada (e.g. Aikenhead, 2000;
Sutherland, 2005 ) and New Zealand (e.g. McKinley, 2005) and these are designed
for the First Nation and Aboriginal people in those settings. The work by
Lubben and others in Southern Africa (e.g. Lubben et al., 1996) comes closest
to this with their focus on the use of contextualised science resource
materials. Such contextualised materials focus on the students’ everyday
experiences and may or may not be culturally based.
There is perhaps less
difficulty in presenting school science in developing countries in a way that
depicts professional relevance. Science-related professions such as medicine
and engineering are usually held in high esteem in such contexts. Because of
the absence of the cultural component of the science curriculum, however, some
potential science-related professions are not highlighted. For example, a great
deal of the bush medicines has not been researched, some indigenous
technologies have not been studied and re-vamped to make them more efficient,
traditional techniques for sustainable development have not been showcased as
effective and worthy of further study, and so on. One cannot help but speculate
about the likely benefits to developing countries if the science curriculum
were made more culture sensitive.
Finally, the science
curriculum can only help to clarify social and human values if these values are
thoroughly understood in context. While some values are universal,
others are not. It is therefore important that the local culture be understood
as a first step toward considering how school science might help students to
clarify social and human values. It is also important that there be no hidden
agenda in the science curriculum that seeks to impose values from the developed
world on students in developing countries without careful consideration of their
welfare and well-being.
A Paradigm Shift?
The approach to science
education in developing countries that is suggested in this paper requires a
paradigm shift from what currently obtains. This shift must be initiated by
science educators in developing countries who understand their cultural context
and the specific cultural characteristics of their students. There is no
pattern from the developed world that can be adopted or adapted – the creation
must come from within. Hopefully, with such a shift, more students from
developing countries would be excited about science and would see the relevance
of science to their own lives and to life in their community and country.
References and/or complementary bibliography
Aikenhead, G. (2000)
Rekindling traditions: Cross-cultural science and technology units. Retrieved
December 4, 2000, from http://capes.usask.ca/ccstu.
Aikenhead, G. (2006). Science
education for everyday life: evidence-based practice. New York: Teachers’
College Press.
Cobern, W. (1996).
Worldview theory and conceptual change in science education. Science
Education, 80(5), 579-610.
George, J. (1995). An
analysis of traditional practices and beliefs in a Trinidadian village to
assess the implications for science education. Unpublished doctoral
dissertation, The University of the West Indies, Trinidad and Tobago.
George, J. (1999).
Worldview analysis of knowledge in a rural village: Implications for
science education. Science Education, 83(1), 77-95.
George, J., & Glasgow,
J. (1988). Street science and conventional science in the West Indies.
Studies in Science Education, 15, 109-118.
George, J., & Glasgow,
J. (1999). The boundaries between Caribbean beliefs and practices and
conventional science. Kingston, Jamaica: Office of the UNESCO
Representative in the Caribbean, 1999. ix, 42p. (EFA in the Caribbean:
Assessment 2000. Monograph Series; No. 10.
Harlen, W. (1987). Primary science:
the foundation of science education. Physics Education, 22, 56-62.
Jenkins, E. (2004). From
option to compulsion: school science teaching, 1954-2004. School
Science Review, 85(313), 33-40.
Lewin, K. (1992). Science
education in developing counties: Issues and perspectives for planners.
UNESCO, Paris: International Institute for Educational Planning.
Lubben, F., Campbell, B.,
& Dlamini, B. (1996). Contextualised science teaching in Swaziland; some
student reactions. International Journal of Science Education, 18(3),
311-320.
Mc. Kinley, E. (2005).
Locating the global: culture, language and science education for indigenous
students. International Journal of Science Education, 27(2), 227-241.
Sutherland, D. L. (2005).
Resiliency and collateral learning in science in some students of Cree
ancestry. Science Education, 89, 595-613.
Reay, J. (n.d.). School
science education in Trinidad and Tobago. St. Augustine, Trinidad: The
University of the West Indies, Faculty of Education.
Van Aalsvoort, J. (2004).
Logical positivism as a tool to analyse the problem of chemistry’s lack of
relevance in secondary school chemical education. International Journal of
Science Education, 26(9), 1151-1168.
Woolman, D. C. (2001).
Educational reconstruction and post-colonial curriculum development: A
comparative study of four African countries. International Education Journal,
2(5), 27-46.
Zembylas, M. (2002). The
global, the local, and the science curriculum: a struggle for balance in Cyprus.
International Journal of Science Education, 24(5), 499-519.
Letting
the voiceless tell their stories
Using oral sources for Caribbean history
writing:
yet more biased accounts?
PhD candidate, Katholieke
Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
milgeorge@yahoo.com
1.
Writing history
How do we write
history? Furthermore, what is history? History can refer to different things.
At a personal level, it is a construction of the mind: the way people remember
and reconstruct past events. It can also be a collective enterprise
whereby a group recalls things gone by. In academic circles, it refers mostly
to the (Western) discipline which records facts that took place in time and
space and offers interpretations about the more or less intentional links
between them, for example, in terms of causal relationships and/or
correlations.
Events that
make up human life have meaning because they are understood and explained as
being part of unfolding stories. The past is past, and of itself it has no voice.
We are the ones who knit the traces of the past into a tapestry of
stories, placing individual events within general frameworks, suggesting
causes, effects, and correlations. History is something that we do. We tell
stories and write histories.
Whichever way
history is understood, it has to do with past events and the way they are used
and explained. Different peoples have told and retold their past in a myriad of
ways. Communities that have privileged the spoken word have used oral
narrations as the channel of their historical consciousness. Others that give
priority to the written word have favoured written documents and sources.
However, history writers, as much as story tellers, have been selective in
whatever and whomever they considered worth being remembered.
When attempting
to write the history of education, one always runs the risk of giving the false
impression that historians always have access to how things were.
History writing always remains storytelling and, as such, it cannot escape being
perspectival. There is not merely one story to be told or history to be
written, but many.
Given that
whatever we write or tell depends on our vantage point, it is necessary while
writing history for academic purposes that we provide others the tools to
assess and critique our story. We need a methodology aimed at transparency.
History and
historiography are not identical. While the former is about telling a story
about the past or letting the past tell some of its stories, the latter has to do
with the history of history writing. Historiography is often used to cover the
history of historical knowledge and interpretation, surrounding non-written
accounts of the past and the broader issues of methodology. Higman speaks of a
focus on the written products of historical thinking but with constant
reference to the larger sphere of social memory and the way in which knowledge
of the past has changed over time, the social recognition and status of
historians, changes in subject matter and source materials, the philosophies
and assumptions of historians, and the ever-changing relationship between
historical interpretation and contemporary social and political contexts
(Higman, 1999:1).
For Higman,
methodology is therefore concerned with the technical concerns of historians
and the theoretical frameworks they employ to interpret and communicate their
findings. The technical concerns relate to the means by which historians
identify and access historical evidence, the means they use to interrogate
these data, and the tools applied to analyze them (Higman, 1999: 1).
2.
Postcolonial history writing
Is our writing
history or thinking about history western-styled or Eurocentric, or
neither? Chakrabarty states that it is insofar as the academic discourse
of history – that is, “history” as a discourse produced in universities – is
concerned, “Europe” remains the sovereign, theoretical subject of all
histories, including the ones we call “Indian,” “Chinese,” “Kenyan,” and so
on (Chakrabarty, 2000: 27).
If the perspective
of the writer conditions the result of his or her findings, we may ask: What
elements of the European “analytical criteria” can and must be adapted to the
St. Maarten reality? Must the way European history of education has been
written be taken as the standard for writing St. Maarten educational
history in “academically acceptable” ways? Would the globalization of the
European historiographical method not amount to a case of intellectual
colonialism insofar as “Europe” would pretend to tell us what is academically
acceptable and what not?
It is not
uncommon for citizens of “postcolonial” countries to accuse North Americans and
Europeans of practicing a form of neo-colonialism, criticizing the claim that
their ways of writing history are normative.[34]
However, if all writing and narrating is done from the point of view of the
writer and/or narrator, then post-colonial history writing will also have its own
bias. In such a case, academic acceptability will lie much more in the degree
to which scholars can justify their method, i.e. the ways in which their data
were collected, pieced together, and interpreted. The methodological question
thus becomes of paramount importance.
3. Written and Oral histories
As said above,
some communities have favoured the written transmission of data and stories
about history over the oral one. Alleyne views the written modality as
corresponding with “European,” “modern,” “urban,” and the latter to “African,”
“folk,” “rural” (Alleyne, 1988:20). This duality has important implications for
Caribbean history writing.
The written and
the oral traditions are well developed and used in the Caribbean. Yet, while
the written tradition or the evidence/documentation theory based on written
documents providing the exclusive source of knowledge of the past can be
arguably described as having ignored the lives and institutions of the average
people, the oral modality has not been granted its due importance.
Given that most
of the written documentation was under the control or supervision of the
colonial masters, the Caribbean written tradition can be seen as a “history
from above.” This history was more often than not written from the perspective
of outsiders, or at least of people who had problems identifying themselves
completely with their geo-social surroundings. The colonized peoples had their
stories, poems, and songs by means of which they voiced their own outlook on
their historical predicament. This was an oral history, a “history from below.”
4. Use of oral sources for writing histories
So-called “oral
history” refers to the history writer’s search for and tapping into the
spoken word as source of relevant information for historical reconstruction.
The historian can use:
-
culturally-sanctioned oral traditions,
-
more or less rehearsed interviews, and
-
printed compilations of stories told about the past.
Oral sources of
information are sought not only to fill in the lacunae in the written sources,
but also to arrive at knowledge which would otherwise not be available.
Information may or may not be available due to the state of the written sources
or their nature. It can therefore not be expected of official school archives,
for instance, that they should provide researchers into the history of
education with information about the thoughts and feelings of the students
while they were seated in their classroom during a lesson of Maths. For a
history writer wanting to reconstruct the unofficial story of colonial
classroom practice, oral interviews of people whose stories have not made it
into the written archives can open new vistas.[35]
However, oral
interviews are not free of problems. Michael Frisch has criticized the
overvaluation of oral history as “Anti-History.” He views “oral historical
evidence because of its immediacy and emotional resonance, as something almost
beyond interpretation or accountability, as a direct window on the feelings and
(...) on the meaning of past experience” (Frisch,
1990). Furthermore, it seems that people seem to
remember different aspects of the past. Tonkin has pointed out that one cannot
detach the oral representation of pastness from the relationship of narrator
and audience in which it was occasioned (Tonkin 1992:2).
History writers
using oral sources must therefore never relinquish the onus of critical
analysis. They need to assess the reliability of the narrator and of
their narration. It is at this point that the researchers must resort to
triangulation to limit the arbitrariness and possible biases contained in the
account of their informant(s). Thus, it will be necessary not only to interview
someone who possesses relevant knowledge, but also to interview more than one
person. Furthermore, the interviewees should ideally be people who represent
different angles of the story.
The above means
that the researchers into oral history face the question how to choose whom to
listen to. History has meaning for people and that is why history still exists
today. As underlined by Thompson, the voice of the past matters to the present.
But whose voice – or voices- are to be heard? (Thompson, 1988:viii) On whose
authority is the interviewees’ (re-)construction of the past based? Whom is it
intended for? And which of the voices interviewed fairly conveys “the voice of
the past” (especially considering that the past has many voices)?
Thus, the issue
of objectivity and subjectivity enters the stage. In the case of oral history,
the most subjective accounts could be described as objective source if and when
we are interested in a person’s feelings, evaluation, or reflection of past
events. However, even when the informants are being interviewed about the more
factual components of an event, their subjective retellings of it will
presuppose a certain degree of objectivity. Dates and places are relative; they
depend on the measures being used. Events are not dated, nor are they mapped.
As Kant indicated, things and events have an existence in themselves which
escapes us. However, we understand them and assign them their place according
to our human frame of mind. Still, within the realm of human subjectivity,
dates and places can be in ascertained in ways which are relatively “objective”
to us humans, for instance, by agreeing on a dating or measuring system. By
using this conventional measuring systems, we can assess whether the
information which our informants hold about past events are only “true for
them” or also “true for others.”
In short, it is
the research question that will determine whether the researcher employing oral
sources must zoom in on the more subjective content (“true for him/her”) or
whether he or she ought to navigate between the subjective lines and go in
search of the more objective details that may transpire out of the accounts
(“true for him/her and true for others”).
Much of history
writing is based on interpretations of data. This is particularly true when
oral sources are used. Not only does the history writer interpret what he or
she hears, the oral informants do, too. The role of memory in the act of
looking back and retelling the past can never be stressed enough (Hodgson,
1975:5; Trillin, 1977:85; Cliff, 1997:594; Portellie, 1991:2). For Portellie, the telling of a story preserves the
teller from oblivion (Portellie, 1981:162). The tale itself creates a special
time, “a time outside time” (Tonkin 1992:3). The characteristic of narrations
is that the narrators need to connect with their own memories and with their
audiences, and both of them have to tap into the structure of the narration.
Oral accounts
are therefore not merely an information-giving exercise, but also an
interpretive account during which the informants try to recall the past as much
as they attempt to explain how they were involved in it. During his or her
research, the history writer using oral sources will therefore have to ask
questions such as the following:
-
Were the different interviewees differently situated in relationship to the
events under discussion?
-
Might they have different agendas, leading them to tell different versions of
the same story?
-
Might intervening events —for example, ideological shifts between the time of
the events under discussion and the time of the interview, or subsequent
popular cultural accounts of these events— have influenced later memories?[36]
5.
Writing histories of education
Our interest is
not only in history writing, but more specifically in writing the history of
primary education in St. Maarten, with special reference to the unwritten
stories of those involved. When researching the “history of education,”
phenomena and processes of education and schooling are being studied in their
historical dimension. While the methodology used is that of “history writing”
as a scientific discipline, the contents of the research are fairly diverse and
relate to all fields of education (e.g. history of family education and child
abuse, history of school realities and innovation processes, history of youth
care and special institutions for handicapped children, history of Educational
Sciences, etc.).
In most cases,
the research focus is limited to the understanding of the evolution of the
educational mentality and practice, and does not intend to contribute to
new theoretical-pedagogical insights, let alone the construction of a new
pedagogical theory. However, the history of education can indirectly give
direction to and be critical of the research being conducted in other
educational areas; it can explain and change phenomena. History shows, for
instance, that things do not necessarily have to be the way they are, simply
because people are always keeping and changing things. Progress has its
continuities, as well as its discontinuities. True historical research
can indirectly offer liberating insights for educational theory and
praxis.
Following the
international trends in the field, the history of education is understood as
part of the “new” social and cultural history. Historical events are
envisaged as cultural phenomena within a long duration of time. The history
writer, too, finds him or herself within cultural processes which colour his or
her analysis, for instance, by imposing present concerns and preoccupations
upon the past.
Caribbean
history and historiography are very complex. Caribbean societies are generally
multi-ethnic and multicultural, although the African- and European-derived
modalities predominate in most cases (Alleyne, 1988:19). This means that the
various segments of the population often harbour their own separate concerns.
Each social layer making up the Caribbean has received a different appraisal
from the old colonial masters and continues polarizing society in different
ways and at different levels.
It is against
the backdrop of these developments that I must raise the following
methodological questions: For whom is my history of education on St. Maarten
being written? Whose concerns am I serving? Will St. Maarteners recognize their
past experiences in my account and analysis of the past development of
education on St. Maarten? Furthermore, will they accept my explanation of the
links between the events, especially considering that “I wasn’t born there”?
6.
Suggestion for future research
In order to
give an example of how the use of oral sources could nuance the input obtained
from written sources, I shall now present a hypothetical research project which
could be conducted in St. Maarten.
6.1.
The official written story
The Methodist
Agogic Center (MAC) was established in 1976 by a letter from the Lt.
Governor on behalf of the Executive Council granting permission for the start
of three Kindergartens and four first grade classes.[37]
Currently, there are two campuses and one main office with early stimulation
classes.
The Mission
Statement of the MAC of 1976 states that it is the school’s aim “to develop and
implement a programme of Foundation Education that will provide for the Total
Development of any child in St. Maarten, creating a learning environment
with many opportunities for self-fulfillment by means of instruction in the Mother
Tongue.” “Mother tongue” means English as language of instruction.
6.2. The unofficial oral stories
If future
history writers took the MAC’s Mission Statement of 1976 at face value and
combined it with current official and unofficial written information about
instruction, they might conclude that the school’s presupposition that the
pupils’ mother tongue is English was still accurate in, say, 2000. After all,
St. Maarten is an English-speaking territory.
However, if our
hypothetical researchers wrote a history “from below” (an oral history),
paying heed to the voice of the parents, they would certainly be in a
better position to reconstruct what is actually happening in the field. They
would be made aware that in today’s St. Maarten, “mother tongue” can refer to more
than one language (e.g. Spanish and Haitian Patois). Conclusions of this type
would also direct the researchers’ attention to other issues related to the
language of instruction, such as classroom climate, teaching effectiveness,
social prejudices, the polarization of citizenship and nationhood in terms of
“St. Maarteners” and “foreigners,” etc. In this hypothetical case, the use of
oral sources would show that the responses of the parents interviewed would
have nuanced the impression given by the official written sources that English
was every pupil’s “mother tongue.”
7. Conclusion
If the writing
of Caribbean history —better still— histories is based solely on the “word” of
written primary and/or secondary sources, we might be misrepresenting the context
within which the events under study took place. By doing this, we might end up
reducing some segments of reality to muteness, while we attribute to others
more representativeness than they actually had. Used critically and
methodically, oral sources can lend a voice to the countless voiceless
protagonists of our local and regional Caribbean histories.
References and/or complementary bibliography
Alleyne (1988).
“Linguistics and the oral tradition,” in B.W. Higman (ed.) (1999), General
History of the Caribbean. Vol. VI: Methodology and Historiography of the
Caribbean, pp. 19-45. Unesco Publishing/Macmillan Education Ltd., London.
Chakrabarty
(2000). Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical
Difference. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Frisch, Michael (1990). A
Shared Authority: Essays on the Craft and Meaning of Oral and Public History,
pp. 159-160. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Higman (ed.)
(1999),General History of the Caribbean Vol. VI: Methodology and
Historiography of the Caribbean. London: Unesco Publishing/Macmillan Education
Ltd.
Hodgson, Godfrey (1976). America
in Our Time. New York: Random House.
Kuhn, Cliff (1997).
“There’s a Footnote to History!’ Memory and the History of Martin Luther King’s
October 1960 Arrest and Its Aftermath,” in Journal of American History
84:2 (September).
Portellie,
Alessandro (1981). “The time of my life: functions of time in oral history,” in
International Journal of Oral History 2.3, pp. 162-180.
Portellie, Alessandro
(1991). “The Death of Luigi Trastulli: Memory and the Event,” in The Death
of Luigi Trastulli and Other Stories, pp. 1-26. Albany: State
University of New York Press.
Thompson, Paul
(1988). The voice of the past: Oral history. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
Tonkin, Elizabeth (1992). Narrating
our pasts: The social construction of oral history. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Trillin, Calvin (1977).
“Remembrance of Moderate Past,” in New Yorker (March 21).
What the Tamarind tree
whispers:
Notes on a pedagogy of tragedy
University of
St. Martin, the
Netherlands Antilles
fguadeloupe@diasporainternational.org
“This is the
miracle: that a fragment of the world, human consciousness, arrogates to itself
the privilege of being its mirror. But this will never produce an objective
truth, since the mirror is part of the object it reflects.”
Jean Baudrillard.[38]
“After gaining their
freedom the enslaved Africans on Saint Martin & Sint Maarten (SXM) were
blinded and deafened by the radiance and the music of flamboyant tree; the tree
of absolute sovereignty. They lost touch with the world; with the Dionysian
forces that should always counterbalance those guided by Apollo; with Exu that
constantly troubles the static civilisational aspirations of Ogun. And we, we
the neglected trees on the island gave them back the gift of sight, smell,
sound, and taste. Through us they understood that all of life is an infinite
rehearsal.”
This is what the tamarind
trees whisper in their silence as they touched me when an old-timer remarked
something to the effect of “don’t get catch under the tamon tree after dark
because jumbies goin’ haunt you.” The old-timer spoke through the voice of a
young educated professional, who prided himself with his masters’ degree earned
at a fancy North American university. Most saw in him a man of the world, a saga
boy, ‘one of the girl’s them sugar,’ as the reggae superstar Beenieman
would put it, a well-groomed professional who drove around in an
air-conditioned car, and who saw it as one of his tasks to shuttle his less
educated countrymen into the 21st century.
This is what I usually saw
in him too. But not today. Today as I heard the whispers of the tamarind trees,
when the old-timer spoke through him, I saw him for what he is, for what I am,
for what we all are on this island, for what all human beings are, and that is
living/dead. There is nothing strange about this. We the living, are the
mouthpieces of the dead. We inherit their tongue and their works. We suckle on
the breasts of those who suckled on their breast, who in turn suckled on
others’ breast, ad infinitum. We, carry the dead within us. Without the
dead we could not be. Hence, we are living/dead.
From the whispers of the
tamarind tree I discerned that this is just the most superficial level of
existence. For, after they had revealed to me that the dead speak through us,
the trees cynically asked who can truly know the dead? And for that matter, the
living? In that questioning I understood what the Greek poet-philosopher
Lucretius meant when he wrote that “by protracting life, we do not deduct one
jot from the duration of death.” Life is coterminous with death. And both of
these terms, life and death, only conceal a more fundamental Nothingness (which
is not an Idea about the absence of an Idea). From this Nothingness, this
unknowable, this non-thought that both founds and demolishes thought,
emerge all partial Somethings, including our concepts of life and death, which
in the end could be nothing but mere illusion.
But that was a too
farfetched and frightening a thought to entertain. I could not entertain it. I
answered the trees in a tongue similar to theirs, the tongue of silence that
speaks through the imagination and bawled, “who me, a nothing? What the world,
pure illusion? Boy what pipe you smoke? We, we human beings, are God’s
creations made in his image and after his likeness. Imago Dei. You all,
you all damn trees with all you bittersweet fruits, contradicting yourselves.
You all are vestigium as Thomas Aquinas put it. If Nothing is
fundamental, then you all don’t exist either. I don’t want to hear anymore of
you all heresy. Leave me alone, cause I have to write a paper on teaching
social studies in the primary schools on the island.”
The tamarind trees laughed.
It was a shrieking laugh that made all the hairs on my body stand up straight,
a powerful feat since the hairs on my body are tightly curled. There is even a
folktale which I grew up hearing about a poor black woman who cheated the Devil
out of snatching her soul. She dared him to iron all her tiny corkscrew curls
straight. The Devil lost. Such a feat could only be accomplished by using Dark
& Lovely in the hands of a Dominican hairdresser. I thought to myself these
trees are more powerful than the Devil himself. I had better go easy on these
trees.
The trees noticed my fear.
They sought to calm me. They said, “you shouldn’t fear us, for we are all
connected. The living/dead landscapes, riverscapes, oceanscapes, and skyscapes,
together with those we support and nurture, your kind, could be nothing but
mere illusion. The problem with your kind is that you don’t listen. We did not
say that you are an illusion, that the world is an illusion. We said
it could be nothing but mere illusion. It was conjecture. Surely a man
of your talents must know what a conjecture is. Like you, we too are enigmas to
ourselves. If you don’t believe us, then heed the words of one of your sages
Ceronetti who once wrote ‘when I think “human condition,” I lose any notion of
happiness or misfortune – the night carries it away, all that remains is a
hopeless puzzle.’[39] You, like us are vestigium. You
represent as another one of your sages Nancy put it ‘only the causality of the
cause, but not its form,’[40] which for all intents and purposes can be a
formless Nothing.
When the oldtimer spoke
about the jumbies under our tree it was to make you aware that reality as you
think it is, is not really Reality. The reality of Phillipsburg with its beach
bars, hotels and casinos is not Reality. The beautiful women in their SUVs and
their French manicures that you drool about are not Reality. The dude boys with
their degrees and verbal acrobatics are not Reality. The discourses of the
rabble-rousers who claim SXM is losing its identity, on the account of all the
newcomers, is not Reality. SXM being shackled by Curaçao and the Netherlands is
not Reality.
Reality, if Reality it is,
is Nothingness. It is unknowable. It is God without the name and the theologies
and rituals you adorn it/her/him with. Reality is a ? We are mediums, we
trees, living/dead like your kind. Why you can hear us we don’t know but we
conjecture that Nothingness (which again is not the Idea of an absence of an
Idea) sent us to assist you in writing your paper for the conference.” And so I
listened. And so I reasoned with the trees. And so I wrote. And so I understood
that those who accept reality as Reality are those who stand for a nationalist
pedagogy of liberation with a romantic bent.[41] Those who understand that they can never
understand Reality, and are content with that realization, stand for a pedagogy
of tragedy; a pedagogy that can be the groundwork of a new style of social
studies that we offer in primary schools.
Pedagogies of tragedy begin
with the fundamental lesson that human beings exist within two non-resolvable
dialectics, namely, that of Dionysus and Apollo, and that of Exu and Ogun. In
plain English this means that we are conscripts of plural metaphysical jails.
And to really understand these jails, we must creolise these dialectical pairs.
Ogun needs to be paired up with Apollo, and the similarities between Exu and
Dionysus need to be appreciated. Africa needs to meet ancient Greece, so as to
open both their particularities to universality. Ogun is the god of
civilisation. Through Ogun humankind received the much needed intuitions on how
to tame fire and smelt iron. Apollo is the God of form and order, and he
presided over our development of medicine and architecture. Without Ogun and
Apollo we would still be running around in caves. Through the combination of
these two forces, mankind engages in the making of culture. This engagement, or
should I say production of culture, brings with it all the comforts of life. It
also brings with it our longing to commemorate the past; to mummify tradition
and culture.
How does this translate to
teaching social studies to pupils attending SXM’s primary school? I am not a
primary school teacher so all I can give is some pointers, leaving the
development of such a program in more capable hands. When we touch upon the
evolution of mankind in our social studies classes, we ought to make pupils
aware of the metaphysical forces of Ogun and Apollo, for it is through these
forces that we became the dominant species among all the animals that populate
the face of this earth. We tamed the earth, only to end up entrapping ourselves
in a manmade objective culture.[42]
We must teach our
schoolchildren that their parents and community leaders longing for some
prelapsarian age may be nothing more than manifestations of our collective metaphysical-linguistic
understanding of the big house of objective culture. Why do I say
metaphysical-linguistic? It is simple. We cannot think without language. And
language always contains an unknown extra-linguistic source (a metaphysical
presence which eludes us).[43] To think even something as self-evident as “I
exist,” I need language. I am always in a phrase and to escape this phrase I
need another phrase. There is no getting out of phrases. We must teach our
pupils to identify this philosophical conundrum with the god Exu.
Exu is the god of
communication. He knows all human and extra-human languages. But he is also
well versed in the language of Nothingness. It is through Exu that we are aware
of the more within our language; that we have a sense of that ever
elusive Beingness of being which we term our Self. It is our awareness
of Exu that reminds us of Dionysus. For our students we must equate Dionysus
with dissent. Dionysus is the force that constantly deconstructs objective
culture. That rebels against it. That summons in us the sense and notion that
the present should not be the slave and handmaiden of a mummified past (whether
these are Romantic-leftist or Romantic-conservative).
After teaching our students
about these four forces we must create a synthesis that forever remains
incomplete. Thus they must come to understand that Dionysus carries within
himself Exu, Apollo, and Ogun, while being part of Exu, Apollo, and Ogun.
Together these four forces should remind them that every civilisation they
learn about in history classes and every contemporary civilisation is caught up
in an infinite rehearsal, which “implies that there is no final performance – a
civilisation never arrives at a final performance – the final performance is
itself an infinite rehearsal.”[44] A special assignment after they have
rationally grasped all this is to have them sit under a tamarind tree and
listen to its numinous whispers……………….deconstructing the power of reality (and
its Father, discursive rationality).
References and/or complementary bibliography
Baudrillard, J. The
Intelligence of Evil or the Lucidity Pact. Translated by Chris Turner. New
York: Berg, 2005.
Blanchot, M. Faux Pas.
translated by Charlotte Mandell. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001.
Harris, W. Selected
Essays of Wilson Harris. London: Routledge, 1999.
Lyotard, J.F. The
libidinal Economy. Translated by Ian Hamiliton Grant. London: Continuum,
2004.
Lucretius. Titus, Carus. The
Way Things Are: The Dererum Natura. Translated by Rolf Humphries. Indiana
University Press, 1968.
Nancy, J.L. The Muses.
Translated by Peggy Kamuf. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996.
Sekou, L.M. National
Symbols: a primer. Phillipsburg: House of Nehesi,
1997.
Changing Times —
Creating Inclusive Schools
University of
the Virgin Islands, USA
Introduction
World leaders in the dawn
of the millennium have agreed to cut poverty around the world in half over the
next 10 years. They have also agreed that all boys and girls need to go to
school because education is one of the most effective ways that young people
and adults can improve their lives. In fact, it is a universal goal to achieve
Education for All Children (EFA) by the year 2015. The EFA movement
is, as its name suggests, concerned with ensuring basic education to
everyone. This movement was launched at the World Conference on Education
for All in Jomtien, Thailand in 1990 and ended up with the World Declaration on
Education for All (the Jomtien Declaration 1990). This declaration came
about due to the following reasons:
Educational opportunities
were limited, with too many people having little or no access to education;
Basic education was
conceived narrowly in terms of literacy and numeracy, rather than more broadly
as a foundation for a lifetime of learning and citizenship; and
Certain marginalized
groups- disabled people in most countries, members of ethnic and linguistic
minorities, girls and women in some countries, were at particular risk of being
excluded from education altogether.
This situation is
particularly true all over the world, of one group of young people who are
often kept out of school, live out of sight in their own homes, communities,
and therefore are more likely to live in poverty than anyone else. This
group of young people are children who are disabled. Disability is when a
person’s physical or mental condition keeps them from being able to function in
an expected manner. People can be born disabled, which is called developmental
disability or can become disabled during their lifetime as a result of an
untreated illness or an accident. There are different kinds of
disabilities: physical, sensory, emotional, hidden or visible disabilities.
The World Education Forum
(2000), points out that there are more than 113 million children with no access
to primary education and 880 million adults who are illiterate. .In developing
countries, the situation is even more devastating. Few disabled children,
and even fewer disabled girls—go to school, even if their disability has
nothing to do with their ability to learn. About 98% of them do not go to
school because in many poor countries, schools are not built with disabled
children in mind. The buildings may be difficult to get to or to get
around. To make things even worse, disabled children are stigmatized and
shunned by the community where they live. Parents often hide their
disabled children. So often, these children are not allowed to play, or
do things with their family and peers. Because many people including some
parents think that children with disabilities cannot learn or develop the
necessary skills that are prerequisite to productive life, not much is expected
from them. When these young children with disabilities grow up, they often must
depend on somebody else to care for them. Disabled people are among the
poorest people in the world because they have not been taught the life-skills
to support themselves that are extended to people without a disability. When
disabled children are allowed and encouraged to learn like everyone else, they
can improve their own lives and the lives of people around them rather than
being dependent on others. If children with disabilities are given the
opportunity, they can be independent, productive and a fully included member of
their communities and can live meaningful lives. Instead of becoming a
social burden, they can contribute to the social and economic well-being and
development of their families and communities. Children and people with
disabilities are marginalized and excluded because they are denied education
and life long learning opportunities.
The main goal of education
must be to ensure that every student gains access to knowledge, skills and
information that will prepare him/her to be a productive member of the
community and workplace. This central purpose is extended to ALL students
and must accommodate students with diverse backgrounds, abilities and
interests. Unfortunately, in most countries and in particular in the
developing countries, a dual system, general education and special education
still exist. In most developing countries, the birth of a child, especially the
birth of a son is a joyous occasion. In many of these countries, a child
is not born with a mouth only but with two hands as well. Children are
expected to contribute to the economy of the family from early. Young
boys from the age of seven will look after the family’s herds -- be it cattle,
camels, sheep or goats. Young girls, assist their mothers by performing
house chores and/ or taking care of their young siblings. Due to the
nature of this subsistence economy where everybody is supposed to contribute to
the livelihood of the family; many parents mistakenly, see the birth of a child
with a disability, or a child acquiring a disability after birth as a tragedy
for the following reasons:
Many parents think that
disabled children need more attention and care as compared to children without
a disability. Unfortunately, some families see such a child as someone
who will be taking away from the meager economy of the family instead of adding
to it. As a result, they find it economically irresponsible to invest in
a child who is perceived as someone who can neither provide for the family nor
be able to support himself/herself. Ashton, B. (1999), rationalizes the
act of such families by saying “Early lack of investment in disabled children
is not just a reflection of ignorance. In situations of poverty, this is
a desperate but rational decision” (p. 1).
In countries where
resources are meager, children with disabilities are the ones who get the
shorter end of the stick. They are fed and clothed less; and if in the
process they get sick, they seldom get treatment. That is why Erb
and Harris-White (1999) did not find many children with disabilities in
some villages in Tami Nadu, India and assumed either there were no children
with disabilities born in these villages or did not survive the ordeal after
birth. It is very probable that the later is true.
Even if children with
disabilities survive these ordeals, their parents are less inclined to send
them to school for a number of reasons. Some parents feel that their
child might not be able to withstand the teasing and the mocking that they may
receive from the other children. In many countries, young children use
the disability form as a nickname to call children with disabilities instead of
using their names. Referring to them as the ‘blind child”, the ‘crippled
child” is very common. Others do not want the neighborhood to know that
they have a disabled child and consequently stigmatize the family.
The story of a young girl from the republic of Mauritania drives the point
home. This is taken directly from her testimony. “When I was one year
old, as a result of a polio epidemic which ravaged a large number of children,
I became disabled. And so, a different life began for me. The life of a girl
who is the bearer of shame. So, I had to keep myself away from others, screened
from indiscreet eyes. Our society thinks that disabilities are a malediction
and persons with a disability are the object of prejudices, which lead to bad
treatment and rejection. I was hidden”
(Coulibaly,www.portal.unesco.org/education/). According to Hunt, P. (1966),
stigmatizing the family might have a serious repercussion by diminishing the
marriage prospects of siblings. Above all many parents decline to send
their children with disabilities to school because they see it as an unwise
investment. In most developing countries, sending a child to school is an
investment. These parents have a choice either to keep the child with
them and allow him/her to help by working at the farm or at home and contribute
directly to the family’s economy or send him/her away to school (in most cases
away from the village) incurring additional expenses. This is not
an easy decision and it takes a lot of thinking and discussing with the
family. In cases where they have more than one child and
cannot afford to send all of them to school, they want to make sure that they
send the one who most likely will succeed.
Having one child does not
make it easier either. Before they send their only child away, they have
to make sure that the child is up to it and that he/she guarantees some sort of
return on their investment. Such decisions are only easy when it involves
a child with a disability. Most parents do not see investing in a
disabled child as a worthwhile investment and decides to give priority to
children without a disability. This means that having a disability is the
single most important factor that keeps children out of school. It is
estimated that out of the 115 million children out of school, 40 million have
disabilities. According to studies commissioned by UNESCO, 98% of
children with disabilities in developing countries are denied any formal
education (Hegarty, 1998). If we look closer to numbers in specific
countries, it is even more alarming. In Tanzania, less than 10 % of the
children with disabilities attend school (Rajani, R., Bangser, M.,
Lund-Sorensen, U. & Leach, V. 2001). Similarly, according to Okidi,
J. A. & Mugambe, and G. K. (2002), in Uganda, in the 1991 Population
and Housing National Census, there were 190,345 persons with disabilities; of
this more than 50% never attended school. Looking into the literacy rate
between people with disability and people without disability, in Baharin, it
was revealed that 27% of the population over 10 years of age were illiterate
compared to 77% of disabled people (Elwan, Ann 1999).
It is clear therefore, that
for many years, children with disabilities have been locked at the back of
their homes or confined to a separate classroom or school where they learn
different things in a different way. This was done under the incorrect
assumption that if you are different you will probably learn less and must be
taught differently. As a result, children with disabilities in poor countries
even if they go to school, they receive inferior education due to the following
reasons:
First and foremost, most of
the schools are built without having in mind people with disabilities.
They are inaccessible, and lack basic equipments. Some children come to
school carried by parents or riding a mule or a donkey. Arriving at
school doesn’t make it easier. At the school they have to contend with
high stairs that lead to the schools and within the schools. No one made this
condition clear than Diarata the young girl from Mauritania when she said
“….Linked to the problem of the behavior of the students were the added
difficulties posed by the environment. It is very difficult to “walk”
under a hot sun and at a temperature, which could be as much as 48 degrees
C. The kilometer which separated my house from my school seemed endless under
the very hot sun and over the burning sand of Kaedi….The classrooms were not
always accessible and public transport was not always adapted to persons with a
disability (Coulibaly, www.portal.unesco.org/education/). The few schools
that are built to accommodate people with disabilities are always over -crowded
and lack the basic resources to do an average work.
Such teachers are heard
saying that they need “special skills” to teach children with
disabilities. This is not necessarily true; a good teacher can teach
children with disabilities and those without disabilities in the same
classroom. Over the years, several good teachers proved that children
with disabilities can be taught in the same classroom with non disabled
children through the use of well planned teaching approaches which encourage
the active participation of all children. This does not necessarily mean
that teachers do not need some technical assistance as how to improve the
delivery of their lessons. Institutions of higher education have
contributed immensely to this problem. Most schools train teachers to
teach in regular classrooms and special classrooms. They call the former,
teachers and the latter, special education teachers. The schools that
certify these teachers told them that they cannot teach children with special
needs if they come to the regular classroom. Only specially trained teachers
are supposed to teach children with disabilities. The irony is that
institutions of higher education talk “inclusion” and practice “exclusion.”
Another reason for the low
achievement is due to the fact that many people have low expectations for
children with disabilities, and worse of all they make them develop low
expectation of themselves. Children with disabilities are expected to do poor
in school because they are not healthy. This notion of not being
healthy is rooted in the belief of some people who consider themselves as
moderate and caring, who have suggested along the way that because of their
health problems, students with disabilities cannot be
placed in regular classrooms and could be placed in a regular classroom only if
their health has improved, which means if their disabilities are ‘cured.’ This
is wrong. Children with disabilities cannot be cured, and if cure is a prerequisite
to inclusion, most persons with disabilities will never be included.
Fortunately, there is a new era; the Era of Inclusion.
As indicated above,
although there are many reasons and the reasons could vary from country to
country and from one culture to another; the most common barriers towards the
education of pupils with disabilities all over the world could be summarized as
follows:
-
weak political will,
-
insufficient financial resources and the inefficient use of those available,
-
inadequate attention to the learning needs of the poor and the excluded,
-
a lack of attention to the quality of learning, and
-
an absence of commitment to overcoming gender disparities.
What is inclusion?
The new philosophy of
inclusion is built on the belief that people/adults work in inclusive
communities, work with people of different races, religions, aspirations,
disabilities. In the same vein, children of all ages should learn and grow in
environments that resemble the environments that they will eventually work
in. That is why inclusion is defined as the practice of placing children
with disabilities in the same (regular) classroom with non-disabled students
and providing them with specialized services and/or curriculum. Ferguson,
1996, describes inclusion as an effort to create schools that meet the needs of
all students where children with and without disabilities are educated together
in age–appropriate general education classrooms. It would entail keeping
children with disabilities in regular education classrooms and bringing the
support services to the child, rather than bringing the child to the support
services (Smelter, Rasch, and Yudewitz, 1996). It is very important to note
that it is not enough to put children with disabilities in a regular classroom
and expect them to learn equally with their peers. Inclusive education
supporters’ advocate that almost all students should begin school with their
peers in the age-appropriate general education classroom, and then, depending
on their needs, move into environments that are more restrictive or less
restrictive. Inclusive education can be thought of as a pendulum clock.
It goes to the right, to the left, and to the right, yet it always comes to the
center. Similarly, children with disabilities should be allowed to go to
the special classes for different reasons and services whenever the need
arises, yet they must come back to the regular classes and learn with their
peers, if that is what is best for the child.
Education is a right and a
privilege
Children with disabilities
have the right to free and appropriate education. This right is embedded in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights which passed on December 10, 1948 by the
General Assembly of the United Nations. The 2nd article of
this historic declaration is very relevant to the cause of people with
disabilities and reads as follows: “Every one is entitled to all the rights and
freedoms set forth in this Declaration without distinction of any kind, such as
race, color, sex, language, religion, or other opinion, national or social
origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no
distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or
international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs,
whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other
limitation of Sovereignty (Universal Declaration Of Human Right, 1948,
Article 2)”.
Although Article 2, as it
is written does not mention the word disability it urges all member states to
extend this right, without exception to all people including people with
disabilities.
After the passage of the
Universal Human right, a giant step towards the improvement of Education of
people with disabilities was taken by the United States of America when on May
17, 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Brown vs. Board of Education declared that
separate education facilities are inherently unequal (Brown vs. Board of
Education 1954). This landmark civil rights case made it clear that
segregating students in schools based on race is unconstitutional. Again,
there was no mention of children with disabilities; however, parents of
children with disabilities in the United States of America were able to use the
refutation of the accepted practices of “separate but equal” as a point of
reference in requesting that their children with disabilities receive free and
appropriate public education. This decision signaled the end of all legal
segregation in the United States of America.
Another giant step was
taken towards the right of all children including children with disabilities
when in November of 1959, the General Assembly of the United Nations proclaimed
the “Declaration of the Right of the Child by General Assembly resolution 1386
(XIV) 20. In this declaration, Principle 5, and 7 are very relevant to
the child with special needs which reads as follows:
Principle 5: “The
child who is physically, mentally handicapped shall be given the special
treatment, education and care required by his particular condition.”
Principle 7: “The child is
entitled to receive education, which shall be free and compulsory, at least in
the elementary stages. He shall be given an education which will promote
his general culture and enable him.”
Mistakenly, many educators,
and other lay persons think that inclusive education is designed to benefit
children with disabilities only. To the contrary,
research shows that inclusive education helps the development of all children
in different ways. Wolery, M. and Wilbers, J, (1994), admits that
although inclusion is primarily designed to include children with disabilities
learn with their peers in the regular classrooms, the benefits are extended to
children without disabilities, parents of children without disabilities and by
and large the whole community. Children with
more typical development gain higher levels of tolerance for people with
differences. They are provided with opportunities to learn more realistic
and accurate views about individuals with disabilities. They are provided with
opportunities to develop positive attitudes towards others who are different
from themselves, not to mention that they are provided with models of
individuals who successfully achieve, despite the challenges.
Investing in inclusive
education is a win, win situation. Students with specific challenges make
gains in cognitive and social development as well as physical motor
skills. In addition, children with disabilities are spared the negative
effects of being taught in a segregated classroom and all the name-calling, and
labeling that comes with it. Under the name of inclusive schools, many schools,
many times, do some sort of labeling without even noticing it. For example,
in one school the whole school is divided into teams. Each team was
given a color. For example, the color for team A is Red and Team B is
Yellow. All of the teams were divided heterogeneously, except that of the
special education students. All of the special education students who
were going to that specific school were grouped together, and were given a blue
color. In other words, the background for their identification card was
blue. The teachers as well as the school administrators, who are in
charge of a certain team, also exhibit the same color of their teams. One
day one of the students from a different team saw one of the assistant
principals exhibiting a blue color since she was in charge of the special
education team. This student came closer and told the administrator “doc,
are you” Specie” (Special) too? All the special education students were
referred to as “Specie”. Regardless of how we do it, grouping or
tracking based on abilities, is a cruel practice and many children with
disabilities have suffered over the years immensely from it. Inclusion is
designed to bring these practices to an end.
It is an undeniable fact
that when children with disabilities are taught in the same classroom with
their peers, they are exposed to competent models that allow them to learn new
adaptive skills and/or learn when to use their existing skills through
imitation. Children learn from each other faster than they can learn from
anybody else.
In addition, when children
with disabilities go to school with their peers, they are afforded the
opportunity to interrelate with competent peers with whom to interact and
thereby learn new social and/or communicative skills. Just like children
without disabilities admire, and try to emulate other students in their school;
children with disabilities will also have a larger pool of young men and women
to emulate and learn from.
Finally, in an inclusive
classroom, children with disabilities will be provided with opportunities to
develop friendships with typically developing peers, and with realistic life
experiences that prepare them to live in their communities. It is only
fair to expose young children with disabilities to young men and women without
disabilities and hear their dreams and their aspirations. Instead of
confining them in one location under the disguise of alternative schools, it
would make much more sense to allow these young men and women with disabilities
to sit and talk with the other students, about colleges and universities, about
careers and professions.
Inclusive education has
also a profound positive effect on the whole community. Wolery, M. and
Wilbers, J., (1994), label’ communities that support and encourage inclusion as
progressive communities, and that as such by supporting inclusion they create a
healthy and financially strong community. Some of the benefits that the
community can receive are as follows:
Conserve resources by
limiting the need for segregated, specialized programs.
Families of children with disabilities
and those without disabilities come together and learn from each other.
Families of children with disabilities might learn about typical development;
develop relationships with families of typically developing children who can
provide them with meaningful support not to mention the fact they may feel less
isolated from the remainder of their communities.
Families of children
without disabilities may develop relationships with families who have children
with disabilities, and thereby make a contribution to them and their
communities. Such encounters will also give them an opportunity to teach their
children about individual differences and about accepting individuals who are
different.
Features of Inclusive Schools
Effective inclusive schools
have certain features, and it is essential that any school that tries to
accommodate children with disabilities exhibit some of the following features:
1. A new breed of
professionals and paraprofessionals: All the staff in inclusive
schools appreciate and value human diversity, and believe that every child has
varied talent and that he/she can learn at high levels, moving at his/her own
pace and is committed to the pursuit of individually configured excellence. In
developing countries; a one-room schoolhouse that had
multi-grades 1-4 and one teacher was common. Such schools were very
effective. Students in this one-room school were not separated and
labeled. They all learned from the one teacher and from one
another. The teacher was expected to teach all kids who
entered the class and every child progressed according to his/ her pace.
Then came the era of modernization or as some people call it
‘westernization. These eras differentiated between regular education
teachers and special education teachers and if there are two kinds of teachers,
there will be two kinds of students: regular students and students with special
needs. It seems that with the advent of trained teachers came
specialization; and with specialization came segregated schooling. The trend is changing now; this new
breed of educators and service providers make students feel valued for their
potential as people, and help them learn to value each other.
2. Collaboration: If
inclusion is going to be successful there should be collaboration and
communication among teachers, families, school administrators, general
educators, special educators as well as para-educators. Teachers working
together not only create more energy around problem-solving and effective
strategies, but they also model people skills for students. As a result,
practices such as cooperative learning, peer tutoring, team teaching, parent
partnerships and common planning time are very essential. When there is
collaborative teaching arrangements and good communication between the
above-mentioned individuals, children with disabilities would get fair and
better education.
3. Changing roles and
responsibilities: In an inclusive school, every person in the
building is a contributor in the learning process. Teachers do not say to
each other these are my students and those are yours. No one would claim
any student. All of the participants- specialist, as well as other
teachers provide support to each other. Every participant in the teaching
and learning process share their expertise in order to use strategies that
assist all students to successfully participate in class
instruction.
4. Access:
Most inclusive schools make all the necessary modification to the building, and
have assistive technology devices available, so that students with disabilities
may access all aspects of the school. There will be no inclusion without
active participation of children with disabilities in the classroom
activities. This active participation is totally dependent on accessible
schools. Access and participation goes hand in hand together, and one
cannot happen without the other. Inclusive schools apply simple
techniques to make schools accessible. Most buildings are one story
buildings with ramps leading inside instead of stairs. The inside of such
buildings are level, avoiding the need for stairs and ramps. Toilets and
latrines are wide enough that a person in a wheel chair can turn around.
5. The use of Assistive
Technology: The 21st century is marked by the fast progress in
assistive technology devices and services, that is evident among the
ever-increasing populations of people with disabilities. These
technological advances have changed the quality of life for many individuals,
helping them to be independent and productive. Assistive technology made
it possible for many people with communication, physical, learning and sensory
disabilities to gain more control over their lives and environment. There are literally
hundreds of assistive technology products. These products have been designed to
collectively meet the needs of individuals across a wide-range of
disabilities—blindness, learning difficulties, etc. as well as temporary or
permanent problems. These
devices vary from computers to speech synthesizers. Others may be less technologically
sophisticated. Simple accommodations such as large print books,
preferential seating, or modified desks, can be sufficient for many individuals
with severe disabilities to be successfully included. The use of such devices
is well discussed (Golden, 1998; Todis & Walker, 1993). Simply put,
if you get children with disabilities on technology as early as possible, they
will be able to influence their environment and explore their surroundings,
otherwise they will become quite content with doing the minimum themselves and
expecting the maximum from others. Inclusive schools through the use of
Assistive Technologies come up with methodologies and strategies to
minimize the effect of the student’s disabilities and help children
with disabilities develop a solid foundation in basic skills at lower grades
and scientific, analytical and communicative skills at higher levels. In
inclusive schools, most educators do realize that the absence of assistive
technology devices have a profound, limiting effect on the life of
children with disabilities
6. New Forms of
Accountability: As in the traditional way, inclusive schools do not
totally depend on standardized tests to determine if students are progressing.
In fact, standardized tests are coming under fire from different angles.
Many contemporary educational leaders and researchers are blaming standardized
tests for:
Encouraging the
accumulation and recall of fragmented and decontextualized facts and skills.
Stifling teachers from
enriching the curriculum by making them focus on the information, forms and
formats required in the tests.
Reinforcing bias in terms
of gender, race, ethnicity and social class.
Instead,
inclusive schools practice new alternative assessments such as curriculum-based
assessment and portfolio assessment that yield meaningful information to
parents, teachers, and students. These new professionals are coming
together to develop new assessment instruments and/or accommodations to go
along with taking standardized tests. These make sense, since the pace,
style, language and circumstances of learning will never be uniform for
all. Sound practices of full inclusion, always advocate for diverse
formal or less formal approaches as long as they ensure sound learning and
confer equivalent status.
7. Student –Focused:
Inclusive schools are student -focused (person oriented) while traditional
schools are deficit driven. The traditional schools always forget the
person with disability as a person and focus on the child’s disability by saying
he/she is autistic; or put emphasis on the person’s deficit by saying “he/she
functions at a 12 month level. To the contrary, inclusive
schools use person-centered planning approaches that encourage teachers and
other service providers to plan learning activities around the individual’s
gifts and capacities instead of his /her disabilities or deficits. The
whole idea of the person-centered approach is designed to encourage teachers to
build classroom activities that are individualized and responsive to the
individual’s personal needs, experiences, and interests.
8. Continuing
Professional Development: In most inclusive schools, the
administration and staff take staff development very seriously. In most
cases, there are committees to determine and design professional development
activities that focus on knowledge and skills that they can use to teach all
students.
9. A Sense of Community:
A well designed inclusive school is distinguished by valuing and supporting all
children and adults and accepting them to participate fully. In such
schools differences are looked at as sources of knowledge and strength from
which to build.
10. High standards:
In an inclusive school, all students are supported in the achievement of valued
outcomes. In such schools curriculum for students with disabilities is
not watered down, neither students with disabilities are assigned to a separate
set of standards. If necessary, however, students with disabilities can receive
individualized accommodations to reach the same high standards.
11. Partnership with
Parents: Families have a major contribution to make to children’s
education. This could only happen when educators understand that parents
of children with disabilities are experts in their own right. If there is
anyone who knows the most about a child with a disability, it is the parent
(s). As a result, in inclusive schools, parents must be accepted and
recognized as partners and brought into the school through various means:
committees, volunteers, and guest lecturers. Building effective
partnership between schools and families must be preceded by the following:
Schools must understand and
acknowledge children’s right as it is outlined in the UN Convention on the
Right of the Child. This involves recognition of the entitlement to a
home, family and membership of the local community as basic rights of the
child. This right allows children to live with their parents while they
are receiving proper education. Taking them away from their families and
communities in order to receive proper education is unwarranted.
Similarly, it is important
that the schools and the community at large understand that the right to having
a family is only meaningful if the child is fully included in the family.
If the ultimate goal is for children with disabilities to be included in
society, it is necessary that this begins within their own family. In
some cultures, when families of children with disabilities realize that their
child is different, it might create a strenuous relationship. In such a
situation, inclusive schools have a role to play by encouraging open
communication between the family and other families and/or between the family
and the school in order to relieve stress, rebuild hope, and enable the child
to experience family life.
Children can do well in
school if learning and development is reinforced at home. When parents
and teachers work together, children will learn more. Inclusive schools
by design are meant to support the child’s learning and development at home, by
offering parents appropriate learning experiences to help their children learn
and grow.
Parents have a wealth of
information about the disability of their child; how their child is developing,
and what would be their educational needs. It is very difficult for
teachers and school administrators to acquire this sort of information.
Such information could be made available for educators only and if the school
develops a cooperative working relationship between the school and
families. One of the main responsibilities of inclusive schools is to do
just that.
Inclusive schools are
supposed to make sure that parents have a right to be involved in the decisions
that are made about their children. The era whereby experts come together
and make decisions that affect the lives of children and their parents is
gone. This new era of inclusion encourages parents to be present in
meetings at school or local and/or state offices of education where the status
of their children will be discussed. Inclusive schools do not require the
presence of parents only; but also prepares them to play a meaningful role by
inviting them to attend educational seminars and workshops to develop
leadership skills.
12. Leadership at the
micro and macro level: There is no question about it, from top to
bottom; the leadership must support inclusion for it to be successful. When the
leadership at the building level is supportive of inclusion, they will sell the
concept of inclusion to their faculty and staff. The Principal in inclusive schools
must play a crucial role by supporting teachers’ effort to collaborate, and
encourage them to experiment and try new ideas. Principals in inclusive
schools should strive to achieve the following:
Accessible schools:
It doesn’t require a fortune to make schools accessible. Fortunately in
most developing countries, schools are built as a one story building, and it
might not take that much to have wide doors and open corridors.
Educational leaders should always be mindful of the fact that it is easier to
make schools accessible when you first build them rather than to fix them at a
later date.
Collaborative teaching
arrangements - teachers working together not only create more energy around
problem-solving and effective strategies, but they also model people skills for
students. Principals in inclusive schools always emphasize and reward the
spirit of working together.
Flexible school structures
- schools need physical arrangements that are adaptable to a variety of student
needs as well as instructional approaches. One of the new things that teachers
of inclusive education should consider is what is coming to be known as “Block
Scheduling”, especially, when a school is made up of buildings that are apart.
It might be difficult for children with mobility disability to move faster from
one class to the other on time. Therefore, scheduling classes for a
longer period and in the same classroom might be helpful. Block
scheduling is a new concept being practiced in the United States schools.
It might have some relevance with inclusive schools.
Performance-based and
alternative assessments - there are many ways to demonstrate learning, and
student performance expectations should be as individualized as their
instruction.
Cooperative teaching and learning approach
One of the best and the
most effective technique is what have been advocated for years in regular
classrooms as the cooperative teaching and learning approach. Here the
special educator, the speech therapist, the psychologist and other support
personnel co-teach alongside the general education teacher. This does not
necessarily mean that every lesson, every unit throughout the year must be
taught in collaboration with the other members of the support staff. It only
means that these individuals work with the regular education teacher whenever
it is necessary. The regular education teacher is in charge of his/her
class; and all of the above mentioned specialists are there to assist.
Sometimes they could come to the classrooms and teach a lesson, or make a
presentation. Other times, they can take anyone of the students who need
special assistance and work with that student separately.
In this model, students
could be divided into small groups. The group is very heterogeneous and
is based on anything else but ability. Students could be grouped based on
their interest and work together to achieve group goals. One of the
responsibilities emphasized for such a working group is that the group is
responsible to demonstrate that all members have learned something. The
teacher must make it clear to all members of the group that it is important
that all members understand the concepts and master the skills to be acquired
from the group activity. All members of the group are made aware that
they are responsible to assist other members to ascertain their knowledge of
the same content. This approach is recommended highly for inclusive
classrooms since children with disabilities are included as members of the
group without much difficulty.
One method of teaching that
is particularly associated with the cooperative teaching and learning approach
is “Student Teams-Achievement Divisions (STAD) method devised by Salvin and his
associates at John Hopkins University. Here students are assigned to four
or five member groups. Once these assignments are made, a four step cycle
is initiated: teach, team study, test and recognition. Teaching is done
in different ways, including the lecture-discussion method. Once the
teacher covers the different materials, group members are instructed to study
together. Teacher made worksheets and answer sheets are distributed to
help them study better. During the study period, students are told that
they will have to support one another because the group goal can be achieved
only if each member learns the materials being taught. They are told that
the teams are not in competition with one another. After the study
period each student is tested individually and a score for each group is
tallied. Based on the score each group receives certificates that read
“GOOD TEAM”, “GREAT TEAM”, “SUPER TEAM” are issued to each group.
Co-teaching
Co-teaching is defined as
two educational professionals delivering substantive instruction to a group of
heterogeneous students with diverse learning needs. This collaborative
approach allows all students including those with disabilities to remain in the
general education classrooms. Current educational research shows that
co-teaching is an appropriate instructional approach to be used in inclusive
classrooms and can improve educational programs, and reduces stigmatization for
students if planned properly and given the necessary support (Focus on
Exceptional Children. Vol. 28 (3), 1995).
A co-teaching relationship
may consist of some combination of a general education teacher, special
education teacher, and/ or support staff. The most common team of
educators found in co-teaching relationships may include the following:
-
Special education teacher and General education teacher
-
Two general education teachers teaching the same subject vertically or
horizontally or teaching different subjects.
-
A paraprofessional and a general education teacher or a special education
teacher
-
A regular education teacher or a special education teacher and a school
counsellor or a school psychologist.
-
A regular education teacher or a special education teacher and a speech and
hearing specialist.
-
A regular education teacher or a special education teacher and a parent.
It is very possible that
any on of the above mentioned combinations can be successful in delivering
effective instruction provided they are given enough time to know each other
and be able to cultivate a collaborative relationship and prepare good lessons
together. Deliberate and ongoing communication among everyone
involved is essential (Cook and Friend 2003) Above all co-teaching will only be
successful if it is given support at the micro, mezzo and macro levels of
the school system administration.
In his article,
Co-teaching: An Effective Approach for Inclusive Education, Donni Stickney
(2003) writes that co-teaching can use a variety of techniques depending on the
students and the content they are teaching. A few techniques cited by Stickney
are as follows:
Interactive Teaching:
Here a general education teacher and a special education teacher teach a lesson
together. One of them introduces the lesson and teaches the main concepts
and /or skills while the other teacher directs the guide practice or what is
called the “sit work”. In such an approach teachers can alternate roles
of presenting, reviewing, and monitoring instruction at any time.
Station Teaching: Here you
divide the students into small groups and allow them to rotate from one station
to another. Each teacher would take a small group while another group of
students is using the classroom computer to research a topic. During the
course of the week, all students work at each task/station.
Parallel teaching: This
technique requires that students are divided into two small mixed ability
groups. One of the co-teaching partner works with a small group of
students while the other co-teaching partner works with another smaller
group. Both groups are taught the same content by two different teachers.
Alternative Teaching:
Here a specialist works with a small group of students on an enrichment project
or a special topic. This small group might be working in an area of
interest or an area where special assistance is required. While the
specialist works with the small group, the general education teacher will work
with the remainder of the students.
Consultant Model: The
consultant model allows the special education teacher to pull-out the students
with special needs and work with them separately as a group or one by one, but
also co-teaches within the general education classroom several hours a week.
Integrated teaching approach
For many years many
teachers have succeeded in teaching different subjects as separate
entities. Many teachers failed to realize that History and Geography;
Chemistry, Physics and Mathematics have a lot in common and cannot be taught in
watertight compartments. The integrated teaching approach brings this to
an end. Integrated teaching is defined as organization of teaching
matter to interrelate or unify subjects frequently taught in separate academic
courses or departments (Joglekar, S., Bhuiyan, P.S., and Kishore,
S.1994). Shoemaker, B. (1989) defines it as an approach that cuts across
subject-matter lines bringing together various aspects of the curriculum into
meaningful association. However, it is Krogh’s (1990) explanation that
make it very relevant to be used in inclusive classrooms when he wrote that
this approach allows children to learn in a way that is most natural to
them. Teachers can teach units made up of themes of interest to the
children. Such units are designed to be relevant, meaningful and flexible
in its application; taking into consideration the diverse learning styles of
the students. Another approach suggested by Lillian Katz and Sylvia
Chard (1989), is called the Project Approach. Here students are asked to
select a topic of interest, researching and studying it by forwarding
hypothesis, collecting data and suggesting solutions to problems.
The integrated approach can
be used horizontally which means that two or more teachers teaching the same
subject or different subjects but at the same grade come together and plan a
unit. For example, an English teacher and a History teacher in grade four
comes together and they plan a unit. It could also be used vertically
whereby teachers in two different grades come together to plan and teach a
unit. A Biology teacher (agriculture) and a Physical Education teacher could
come together and plan such a unit. This approach might be more
appropriate at higher educational levels.
The integrated teaching
approach can enhance teaching and learning in inclusive classrooms if is
applied properly. Its proper application would require the creation of an
environment that encourages active involvement of all students. In
addition all topics and themes chosen must help students relate to real life
experiences and be able to transfer such knowledge and apply it in real life.
Conclusion
World leaders reached a
consensus to cut poverty in the world in half over the next 10 years. They have
also agreed that all boys and girls born in 2005 be able to complete primary
schooling by the year 2015. These goals are noble and timely; but in order
to make them a reality we have to include all children –including those with
disabilities. You cannot cut poverty while you eliminate the economic
contributions of people with disabilities.
One of the many steps that
have to be taken to achieve the MDG and EFA goals is that all participating
nations must come up with explicit educational policies that foster the
inclusion of pupil with disabilities. When inclusive schools are created
and pupil with disabilities are welcomed and valued, research has demonstrated
that all students, those who have special needs as well as those considered as
typical, benefit. Pupil with disabilities will develop better socially and
intellectually, and those without disabilities will become more familiar with
the problems that children with disabilities face which would make them more
sensitive to the needs of people with disabilities.
When pupils with
disabilities are included in the regular classroom in an increasing number, teachers
will be forced to come up with lessons that are tailored to the need of a
diverse student population. There are some general education teachers who
believe that they are neither trained nor experienced to teach children with
disabilities. This is not true. Cannon, G. (1992) conducted a
study on teachers and found out those teachers in general and special education
agreed on 82% of essential teaching practices for effective instruction of
children with disabilities. In other words, the teaching methods that are
used by special education and general education teachers to teach children with
disabilities are the same. Consequently, any teacher of inclusive
classrooms who would care to use the teaching techniques discussed in this
manuscript with little adjustment will yield good results. Their success in
becoming successful teachers of inclusive classrooms could also be facilitated
if they can use technology to individualize instruction and expose their
students to adopting assistive technology devices and services...
References and/or complementary bibliography
Ashton, B. (1999).
Promoting the Rights of Disabled Children
Cannon, G, (1992).
Educating students with mild handicaps in general classrooms: Essential
teaching practices for general and special educators. Journal of
learning disabilities, 25 (5) 300-317
Coulibaly, Diarata.
My Life is a Succession of Battles to Survive. Available from:
http://portal.unesco.org/education/ev.php-URL_8137&url_DO=DO_TOPIC&U
Elwan, Ann. Poverty
and Disability: A Survey of the Literature - Social Protection Discussion
Paper Series. No. 9932. World Bank, Washington DC: December 1999.
Erb, S., &
Harris-White, B. (2001). The Economic Impact and Developmental
Implications of Disability and Incapacity in Adulthood; A Village Study
from S. India. Paper to the Workshop Welfare, Demography and Development,
September 11-12, Downing College, Cambridge