Teacher empowerment as a strategy for educational change

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Date
2001
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University of Zululand
Abstract
One of the greatest challenges facing teachers in the new democratic South Africa has to do with understanding and facilitating change in education. The question of how teachers can be empowered at the school level was, therefore, a problem necessitating this research. The aim of the study was to discover educationally accepted ways and means of empowering teachers for change. It aimed at establishing what teachers need to do to acquire self-empowered behaviour, and what principals ought to do to see to the empowerment of their teachers for change. To carry out this study, the student made an in-depth study of literature on educational change and the empowerment role of principals. For empirical investigation use was made of observation method and interviews. The major findings that have emerged from this study are that teachers are not adequately involved in implementing changes directed by current policy documents, and that there is very little that is being done at school to promote change. Another finding is that schools are found to be lacking resources that may be utilized to promote or facilitate change, such as democratic governance, human rights culture and curriculum change. The principals were found to be doing very little to assist and motivate teachers for change. It was found that there was lack of efforts to facilitate self-empowered behaviour among both teachers and principals. The recommendation suggested focus on action to be taken by both teachers and principals. The principals are responsible for facilitating the implementation of change by empowering teachers at a school level.
Description
Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Education in fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of Master of Education in the Department of Education Planning and Administration at the University of Zululand, South Africa, 2001.
Keywords
Teacher empowerment, Educational change
Citation