Prelims

Half Title Page

The Emergence of Teacher Education in Zambia

Series Page

Emerald Studies in Teacher Preparation in National and Global Contexts

Series Editors:

Teresa O’Doherty, Marino Institute of Education, Dublin, Ireland

Judith Harford, University College Dublin, Ireland

Thomas O’Donoghue, University of Western Australia, Australia

Teacher preparation is currently one of the most pressing and topical issue in the field of education research. It deals with questions such as how teachers are prepared, what the content of their programmes of preparation is, how their effectiveness is assessed and what the role of the ‘good’ teacher is in society. These questions are at the forefront of policy agendas around the world.

This series presents robust, critical research studies in the broad field of teacher preparation historically, with attention also being given to current policy and future directions. Most books in the series will focus on an individual country, providing a comprehensive overview of the history of teacher preparation in that country while also making connections between the past and present and informing discussions on possible future directions.

Previously published:

Teacher Preparation in Ireland

By Thomas O’Donoghue, Judith Harford, Teresa O’Doherty

Teacher Preparation in South Africa

By Linda Chisholm

Historical Perspectives on Teacher Preparation in Aotearoa New Zealand

By Tanya Fitzgerald and Sally Knipe

Catholic Teacher Preparation

By Richard Rymarz and Leonardo Franchi

Teacher Preparation in Northern Ireland

By Séan Farren, Linda Clarke and Teresa O’Doherty

Forthcoming in this series:

Teacher Preparation in Singapore: Different Pasts, Common Future?

By Yeow-Tong Chia, Jason Tan, Alistair Chew

Teacher Preparation in Scotland

By Rachel Shanks

Teacher Preparation in France

By Imelda Elliott and Emeline Lucuit

Title Page

The Emergence of Teacher Education in Zambia

By

Brendan P. Carmody

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK

First edition 2020

Copyright © 2020, Brendan P. Carmody.

Published under exclusive licence by Emerald Publishing Limited.

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-78756-560-9 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-78756-559-3 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-78756-561-6 (Epub)

Contents

Foreword

This study on The Emergence of Teacher Education in Zambia is an outstanding contribution to the global story of educational development. With painstaking attention to historical and scholarly detail, Professor Carmody delineates the transition within Zambia from teacher training to teacher education. In doing so, he maps out in considerable detail how, over a period of more than a century, teacher education evolved from imparting a narrowly conceived ability to transmit the three R’s, through delivering some of the basic skills needed for formal employment, down to developing the in-depth knowledge and understanding of subject-matter that are required today. As he does so, he depicts in fine detail the education sector’s response to changing social and political situations, reshaping and reformulating its teacher formation programmes and policies in the light of public expectations, economic realities, political aspirations and the limits of the possible.

At the same time the book brings out the steady increase in government control of the education system and the way this was seldom accompanied by a corresponding increase in resources. From beginning to end, education comes out strongly as the ‘poor cousin’, lacking the resources needed for responding to the high expectations of a rapidly increasing population and the dictates of not-always-creditable political elites. That it came to its present moderately developed state is a remarkable tribute to human tenacity and popular faith in the high value of education.

Throughout the study, Professor Carmody laments the way the preparation of teachers has remained narrow, concentrating its efforts on equipping prospective teachers with the skills needed to enable their future pupils climb the social ladder. He finds this to be far from the ideal so eloquently expressed by one of his informants who said what she finds attractive about teaching is that it provides her with an opportunity to do what she loves, ‘mould and guide learners so that they have an impact on society and make it a better world’. The ideal is that teacher education should imbue all teachers with a similar spirit so that they would be empowered to educate not solely for jobs but also for flourishing lives. Unfortunately, this is far from being the situation in Zambia, and very likely in many other parts of the world, where an urgent need remains for a more future-inspired and professional approach to teacher formation.

Professor Carmody finds that this call for a more professional approach to the enterprise of being a teacher has been mooted many times in the past, but has been thwarted by the social, political and even academic view that the primary and secondary school teacher has a very minor role to play as a thinking, decision-making, reflective and autonomous professional. The book notes the troubling implication of this failure to recognise the wealth of experience, understanding and good will present in most teachers, to say nothing of the enormity of the responsibility society places on them – that she or he is in effect merely a second-class professional, constrained to survive in a poorly paid career with unattractive prospects and very little motivation to excel on the job. What is required, the book pleads, is to effectively upgrade the status of teaching, not just by improvements in salaries, career prospects and conditions of service, but also by clearer public recognition that the teacher plays a crucial role in preparing the oncoming generations – in ‘moulding and guiding learners’ – for their life, performance and happiness in a rapidly changing world.

Lurking in the background of Professor Carmody’s study are the ever-present questions:

What next? Where will education in Zambia go from here? What new developments are needed to correct what has gone before and reform teacher education so that classroom practitioners can become the channel for the formation of responsible, caring, satisfied, imaginative, adequately informed young adults? Can it be brought about that teachers become ‘transforming intellectuals’? What can be done to upgrade the status of teachers and the image of teaching as a career?

Hopefully, with the considerable scholarship at his disposal, Professor Carmody will address questions such as these and point us to the next stage in the evolution of teacher education, not only in Zambia, but also in Africa and throughout the world.

Michael J. Kelly, S.J.

Luwisha House, Lusaka, Zambia

Formerly Deputy Vice-chancellor, University of Zambia, Dean of School of Education, and Professor of Education

Acknowledgements

As this book emerges, there are many to whom I am grateful. First and foremost, I would like to acknowledge the major contribution of Professor Austin Cheyeka of the University of Zambia who provided much data from interviews and contact with those linked to teacher education in Zambia today. His contribution is particularly evident in Chapters 4 and 5.

To be acknowledged and thanked for substantial input on teacher education is Professor Michael J. Kelly whose experience of the Zambian setting is extensive and who was ready to share from his memory.

I also greatly appreciate the encouragement and support of Professor Tom O’ Donoghue of the University of Western Australia without whose prompting this would not have been undertaken.

The research is historic and for it I depended almost entirely on the resources of the Institute of Education, University College London. I am however especially grateful to Donal O’Murchu for some original documents and recollections linked to his time as a lecturer in Charles Lwanga College in the late 1960s. As indicated, much back-up comes from interviews and emails for which I am also grateful. John Mujdrica S. J. provided contacts with teachers in whose education he featured over many decades during his time as lecturer at Nkrumah, Charles Lwanga and Catholic University, Kitwe. I appreciate this.

However, I am solely responsible for whatever shortcomings this work may have.

Brendan P. Carmody S. J.

Research Associate, Institute of Education, University College London, UK

Visiting Professor, St. Mary’s University, London, UK

Carmody.brendan4@gmail.com