Abstract
The aim of this chapter is to develop a critical view of education quality appropriate for sub-Saharan African countries facing the challenges of globalisation in the twenty-first century and to discuss the implications of such a view for research. The chapter begins with a review of existing approaches to conceptualising education quality within the Education for All (EFA) movement, most especially the framework presented in the 2005 EFA Global Monitoring Report, The Quality Imperative (UNESCO 2005). This will be used as a basis for setting out our own approach which draws inspiration from Sen’s (1999) notion of capabilities and for considering the research implications of this through a focus on the research processes and approaches of the Implementing Education Quality in Low Income Countries (EdQual) Research Programme Consortium (RPC). Before proceeding, however, and in order to contextualise the debate, it is worth setting out some of the basic features of the EdQual RPC and what we understand by a capabilities approach.
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Notes
- 1.
In 2002, Southern and Eastern African Consortium for Monitoring Educational Quality collected pupil-, class- and school-level data from around 40,000 Year 6 pupils across 14 countries, namely Tanzania (Mainland), Zanzibar, South Africa, Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, Swaziland, Uganda and Zambia.
- 2.
In this regard, as Butcher has pointed out, of the 818 million people in Africa, 1 in 4 have a radio, 1 in 13 have a television, 1 in 35 have a mobile, 1 in 40 have a fixed-line telephone, 1 in 130 have a personal computer, 1 in 160 use Internet and 1 in 400 have a pay TV (Butcher,2001).
- 3.
Besides the NEPAD e-school initiative, there are several other initiatives: Catalyzing Access to ICT in Africa (CATIA) (http://www.catia.ws), Global E-school and Community Initiative (http://www-wbweb4.worldbank.org/disted /) and Leland Initiative- Africa Global Initiative(URL:http://www.usaid.gov/regions/afr/lelnad/).
- 4.
Related to the above point is that older, non-digital ICTs also have an important role to play in supplementing teacher knowledge and providing increased opportunities for disadvantaged learners. Whilst digital technologies might transform education in the longer term, an exclusive focus on newer ICTs is likely to disproportionately benefit elites who have access to them and have the effect of exacerbating the digital divide at least in the short term.
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Barrett, A.M., Tikly, L. (2010). Education Quality: Research Priorities and Approaches in the Global Era. In: Mattheou, D. (eds) Changing Educational Landscapes. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-8534-4_11
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