Thirusellvan Vandeyar

Impediments to the successful reconstruction of African immigrant teachers’ professional identities in South African schools

The purpose of this study was to explore difficulties and challenges that confront African immigrant teachers as they attempt to reconstruct their professional identities in South African schools. The study was qualitative in nature and utilized narrative inquiry and the case study approach. Data-gathering techniques included a mix of semi-structured interviews, observations, focus group interviews, field notes and researcher journals. Data were analysed using grounded theory and content analysis methods. Findings of the study revealed that immigration status, employment status, attitudes of indigenous learners and holding on to former culture or way of knowing due to lack of induction or mentoring, were impediments to the successful reconstruction of African immigrant teachers’ professional identities in South African schools.

Re-negotiating identities and reconciling cultural ambiguities : socio-cultural experiences of Indian immigrant students in South African Schools

Abstract South Africa has become the host country of destination not only to immigrants from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region, but also from countries such as India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Much research has focussed on Black Immigrant students experiences in South African schools. Little if any research has addressed experiences of Indian immigrant students.Utilising social constructivism, case study approach and narrative inquiry, this study sets out to explore the socio-cultural experiences of Indian immigrant students in South African schools. It was found that contests of space and place in South African ‘schoolscapes’were not so much about ‘race’ as it was about nationalism and territoriality. For South African Indian students, international competition was not an abstract policy; it entered the school through immigrant students. For Indian immigrant students international acceptance implied a re-negotiation of identities and a reconciliation of cultural ambiguities.

Opposing gazes : racism and xenophobia in South African schools

Utilising a qualitative case study approach, this research study set out to understand discrimination experienced by immigrant students in their interactions with South African students and the prejudice immigrant students expressed against Black South African students. Findings reveal that the discrimination experienced by immigrant students could be clustered into four broad themes, namely categorisations and prototypes; practised stereotypes; academic and social exclusion; and work ethic. Furthermore, statements immigrant students make about South African students seem to fall into two broad categories, namely lack of value for moral integrity and lack of value for education. Educating students to value human dignity and to view each other as cosmopolitan citizens of the world could be a way to ensure social cohesion and harmony of future generations to come.

A Participatory Approach to the Formulation of an Information and Communication Technology Policy: A Q-Methodology Case Study

This study focuses on policymakers and the intricacies and subtleties surrounding the relationship between policy formulation and policy in practice. It would seem that policymakers assumed that by placing computers in school, all would bode well and the implementation of information and communication technology (ICT) would unfold naturally. Present educational practice has culminated in a mismatch between what is desired by school administrators, as policymakers and what is needed by teachers as policy implementers. This paper focuses on an innovative approach to the formulation of an ICT policy for a school, using Q-methodology case study. The findings of this study indicate that though teachers appropriate different meanings to policy, they are important actors in education and deserve the right to be policy decision makers.