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Masters Degrees (Education, Development, Leadership and Management)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10413/7169

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Browsing Masters Degrees (Education, Development, Leadership and Management) by SDG "SDG4"

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    Attracting and retaining highly skilled academic staff: a case of a technical, vocational education and training college in Johannesburg.
    (2024) Mokgathi, Matome Peter.; Myenda, Phumlani Erasmus.
    Technical Vocational Education and Training colleges like any other institution of higher learning rely on the knowledge, abilities and skills of their academic staff to keep abreast with the changing nature of higher education in the country and globally. These institutions of higher learning must be competitive and strive to achieve their strategic goals for them to remain relevant in the sector. Studies have shown that highly skilled academics are leaving the higher education sector specifically the TVET colleges for the private sector for numerous reasons, including better salaries and personal growth. Therefore, attracting and retaining highly skilled academic staff is very crucial for the success of any institution of higher learning as this calibre of employees ensure that the institution provides quality education to students. Therefore, it is important for the Technical Vocational Education and Training college to develop attraction and retention strategies to keep highly skilled academic staff in the college. Given the importance of attraction and retention of skilled academics, I used a qualitative approach and case study design to explore how a selected Technical Vocational Education and Training college in Johannesburg attracted and retained skilled academic staff members. The study focussed on three research questions namely (i) What does the Technical Vocational Education and Training college management understand to be the factors causing the high rate of academic staff attrition? (ii) How does the Technical Vocational Education and Training college management attract and retain skilled academic staff? and (iii) Why does the Technical Vocational Education and Training attract and retain skilled academic staff the way they do? To understand attraction and retention of skilled academic staff, I drew from Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, and important theory developed by Abraham Maslow (1908-1970), and Human capital theory, propounded by Schultz in 1961 and later developed extensively by Becker (1964). These theories were very useful to the study as they helped me to understand how the Technical Vocational Education and Training college attract and retain skilled academic staff including the factors causing high rates of academic staff attrition and the challenges that the college faces. To collect the relevant data, I used the interview method. The participants were purposively and conveniently selected. They consisted of three campus managers and four divisional managers. In analysing data, I used thematic analysis. The findings suggest that there are various factors leading to high rate of attrition in the college. These factors include the lack of promotional opportunity and poor remuneration. Furthermore, the findings suggest that in addition to the above stated factors, there are challenges that the college faces such as the shortage of academic staff, and the lack of a seamless and effective recruitment process. In addition, the findings also suggest that other than the above factors and challenges, an unsupportive work environment, poor motivation and the provision of inadequate training and career growth also reduces the attraction and retention of skilled academic staff. Based on the findings, I concluded that it is very important for the Technical Vocational Education and Training college to understand the factors that compel academic staff to either stay or leave the college. This will enable the Technical Vocational Education and Training college to develop strategies to retain skilled academic staff and to ensure the provision of quality education to students. From the conclusions, I recommend that college management must revisit the recruitment process and review it to reduce the time that the college takes to approve the appointment of academic staff and that the contracts of academic staff who are employed temporarily must be converted to permanent ones to minimise attrition as they always leave for permanent positions elsewhere.
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    Leadership learning: a case study of departmental heads from two primary schools.
    (2024) Mavundla, Petunia Nokwanda.; Naicker, Inbanathan.
    Departmental heads (DHs) in primary schools in the South African schooling system play vital roles in leading and managing teaching and learning schooling phases. Research indicates that the Department of Education does not offer them formal training aimed at equipping them for their complex roles, nor does it require them to have formal leadership qualifications prior to assumption of duty as DHs. This study sought to explore how these leaders learn to lead. Specifically, it asked the following research questions; what are the departmental heads' perspectives on leadership learning in the case study schools? How do the departmental heads in the case study schools learn leadership? What do the departmental heads in the case study schools view as effective mechanisms for leadership learning? Two theories underpinned this study, namely, the Adult Learning Theory by Knowles and the Leadership Development Conceptual Framework by Lyham. This study is framed in the philosophical dimensions of the interpretivist paradigm within the qualitative approach. The methodology applied to understand how departmental heads learn was a case study. Two schools of the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Education’s Pinetown District were conveniently sampled, and four departmental heads were purposively chosen and interviewed. Document analysis was applied to supplement the data generated from the semi-structured interviews. The findings of the study revealed that departmental heads think it is very important for leaders to learn to lead and they understand that performing their core duties requires specialised guidance. Furthermore, leaders learn differently as driven by their goals. Their lengthy leadership experiences enabled them to recommend context understanding as a vital aspect of the leadership learning process accompanied by support largely from the principal of the school. This study concluded that departmental heads do not receive sufficient support from their school principals upon appointment and recommended that a collaboration between the departmental heads, leaders of Professional Learning Communities and the learned others be formed and a programme for newly appointed departmental heads be designed and shared with other schools in similar contexts.
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    Principals’ meaning of and practices for supporting teachers in promoting inclusive classrooms.
    (2024) Zuma, Thulile Sarah.; Myende, Phumlani Erasmus.
    The purpose of the study was to explore principals’ meanings of and practices for supporting teachers in promoting inclusive classroom in primary schools of the uMgungundlovu District. The duty of the principal is to provide every learner in the school with access to education and to develop the learners’ leadership potential. It is therefore vital to find out how principals understand the inclusive classroom in supporting teachers to promote the inclusive classroom in the selected primary schools, to find out the roles that principals play in the child’s life and in the teachers’ life in terms of support and also the difficulties they (principals) experience in the process of promoting an inclusive environment in the classroom. The study was theoretically underpinned in transformational leadership and Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system theories, in order to explore the leadership practices of the principals. The study used a qualitative case study design within the interpretive paradigm. Qualitative research seeks to explain and understand social phenomena in its natural settings. It concentrates on the meaning people have built concerning their world and the researcher is viewed as the primary tool for data generation and analysis. Face to face semi-structured interviews were employed to generate data. A sample of four participants from the four selected primary schools was purposefully chosen, which constituted the research participants. Ethical considerations, including confidentiality and anonymity, were maintained throughout the research study. The study reviewed related literature from national and international perspectives on leadership practices, in order to understand how principals, support teachers in promoting inclusive classroom. The research findings have revealed that principals play an important role in transforming their respective schools into learning environments that are conducive for teaching and learning through their leadership. The principals considered leadership as a collective effort and practiced collaborative decision- making. Furthermore, the principals’ understanding, and experience enabled them to build good interpersonal relationships with teachers, learners, and other stakeholders. The study has also identified several challenges pertaining to leadership in the inclusive classroom, lack of resources and limited official visits. This study presented the recommendations for practice and for further research.
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    Supporting teaching and learning in out-of-field subjects : a case study of departmental heads.
    (2024) Gumede, Khethiwe Frances.; Myende, Phumlani Erasmus.
    According to the ELRC in South Africa, for an educator to be promoted to Departmental Head he or she must have a teaching experience and a teaching qualification (M+3) with a Relevant Education Qualification Value (REQV 13) as the minimum requirement. The main role of departmental heads is to provide support and assistance in teaching and learning to achieve positive learner results. Due to different circumstances such as a decrease in enrolment, some departmental heads in schools find themselves in a position where they offer support in out-of-field subjects. Therefore, it was crucial to explore departmental heads’ understanding of roles, how they perform those roles, and the enabling and hindering factors of supporting teaching and learning beyond majors. The purpose of the study was to explore the Departmental Heads’ experiences of supporting teaching and learning in their out-of-field subjects. The study is conceptualised within the framework of leadership for learning theory. It used a qualitative case study design within the interpretive paradigm. Eight participants were selected using purposive sampling. Face-to-face semi-structured interviews were employed to generate data and the generated data was analysed using thematic analysis. The research findings revealed that out-of-field departmental heads understood their role to include the provision of guidance and support, monitoring of curriculum, determining the subject needs, departmental vision alignment with the school’s vision and goals, and moderation of tasks. Out-of-field departmental heads applied different strategies to ensure that their roles were performed regardless of the lack of training. Some of the strategies they applied included allocation of subject heads, working with majored departmental heads, pairing their educators with neighbouring schools' departmental heads specialising is similar subjects and attending Professional Learning Communities. Furthermore, the out-of-field departmental heads identified numerous factors they considered to make supporting teaching and learning easier, which include gaining subject content, class size impacts on teaching and learning, communication and motivation. The study has also identified several hindering factors in supporting teaching and learning, which include inadequate resources, lack of development for departmental heads, subject content and curriculum changes as well as workload against time. This study concludes that the departmental heads’ understanding of their roles is common and they confirm what is stated in different departmental policies. It also concluded that the roles performed for out-of-field subjects were the same roles they performed for their majored subjects. However, it can be argued that in the OOF context, leadership of a department is a shared role to accommodate the shortcomings stated by participants. I recommended that the Department of Basic Education consider the position of a subject head to be an official position since they complement the out-of-field departmental heads.