Acknowledgement of personal perspective

In qualitative research, as the researcher is the primary instrument for gathering and analysing data (Merriam, 1998) it is particularly important that they acknowledge any influences of biases, values and beliefs associated with the research. Table 1.2 summarises my: values in terms of foundation education; cultural identity and worldview; and pedagogical understandings and preferences. All of which are potential sources of bias within this study. Chapter Four, section 4.8.1 provides a description of the efforts made to reduce personal bias and influence in the research process.

14 Table 1.2

Acknowledgement of Personal Values, Cultural Identity, Worldview, Pedagogical Understandings and Preferences foundation student. In facilitating the design, approval, accreditation and evaluation of foundation programmes, I have gained a knowledge and understanding of the needs of foundation learners and the priorities of these programmes mostly from a quality assurance perspective. I recognise that I have not experienced the reality of teaching foundation students on a day to day basis or the personal challenges facing students enrolled in foundation programmes.

While never having been a foundation learner in terms of the necessity to take on foundation or bridging programmes, I am a first generation graduate in terms of academic success at a graduate and postgraduate level. This experience has enabled a realisation of the difficulties in progressing academically without support structures, role models or mentors. I also have a great deal of respect for foundation students who courageously undertake foundation programmes when they have had little or no positive experiences from their compulsory schooling years. Finally, in terms of my personal values around formal education, I come from a family which enthusiastically believes in the importance of education and I fundamentally believe that education has the power to transform and empower our lives.

Within my academic management and leadership roles. As an employee I have had a personal vested interest in the successful outcome of the accreditation, approval and evaluation processes for foundation programmes or initiatives that I have facilitated and managed.

I believe I have a sound understanding, appreciation and sympathy to the responsibilities and accountabilities of the senior management teams within ITPs. However, the range of my professional work has, I believe, enabled an affinity with the educators (tutors and/or lecturers) who are dedicated to the success of their students.

While personally valuing some of the intended outcomes of foundation programmes (such as skill acquisition leading to employment and/or attainment of academic skills and knowledge necessary for further educational pursuits), I have become increasingly sceptical of appropriateness of approaches to foundation education that are solely functionalist, skill or competency based.

Cultural identity and worldview

My worldview is grounded within the experience of being a ‘first generation kiwi’ and a

‘Pakeha’ from English and Irish descent. My family grew up in a low socio-economic, east Auckland suburb with a large urban Māori population. I became progressively aware of differences in educational achievement associated with ethnicity and socio-economic factors regardless of individual capabilities or potential to achieve academically. I had very little understanding of New Zealand history from a bi-cultural or colonisation perspective until I studied at these areas an undergraduate level. I also embrace the disciplines of cultural anthropology and sociology that have contributed to my understanding of New Zealand society and culture.

11 A tertiary education institution that offers a wide diversity of continuing education, including vocational training, and that conducts research, particularly applied and technological research.

15 Table 1.2

Acknowledgement of Values, Cultural Identity and World View and Pedagogical Understandings and Preferences (continued) appropriate epistemological or pedagogical approaches to examining foundation education at NorthTec and I recognise that researchers do not have to identify as Māori either in terms of ethnicity or cultural identity to take these approaches. However, it was felt that the critical theory approach, based on values of “emancipation, social change, egalitarianism and critical enlightenment” (Simons, 2009, p. 35) was a good fit with my cultural identity (as a member of the more dominant Pakeha culture) and values around foundation education. I also consider that critical theory can recognise Māori pedagogies within its framework and focus.

Pedagogical understandings and

preferences

I hold the view that critical theory or pedagogical approaches are entirely appropriate for most foundation education provision. I have also experienced the ways that critical theory or pedagogy is perceived by tutors, educators of tutors, managers/administrators and policymakers/influencers. Through a degree of ‘practice wisdom’ arising from my experiences with a range of pedagogical approaches within the ITP sector, I am aware that explicit critical pedagogical approaches or teaching strategies are not prevalent in programme design or in-house, entry-level tutor education programmes. Also, in my opinion, despite the TEC’s investment in funding literacy and numeracy provision and the NZQA offerings of the NCALNE (Voc) and NCALE (Educator)¹³, critical pedagogical approaches are not robustly considered within external or national foundation educator development programmes. This may be partly due to the perceived radical or even revolutionary overtones of critical theory. Critical theory or pedagogical approaches to tutor education programmes do not sit well with functionalist approaches to teacher education. The functionalist focus within programmes such as CAT is for the new tutor, who often comes straight from industry, to develop basic teaching techniques (lesson, teaching, assessments and moderation plans) so that they can engage the students to achieve successful assessment, course or qualification completion. This approach to educating the educators or ‘pre-service education’ is a mechanism that Degener (2001, 2006) recognises as creating and perpetuating the dichotomy between critical and technicist/functionalist approaches to tertiary teaching.

Foundation educators, who come into the ITP sector already possessing teaching or education related degrees, would have been likely to have studied critical theory and pedagogical approaches within their degree programmes. I am also aware, through my various academic management roles, of a number of inspired tutor educators and/or mentors, who incorporate aspects of critical theory in their teacher education programmes in terms of strategies for tutors to engage and retain second-chance and/or foundational learners.

12 See glossary of Māori Terms for Kaupapa Māori or Mātauranga Māori terms.

13 NCALE (Educator): National Certificate in Adult Literacy and Numeracy Education (Educator) and NCALNE (Voc): National Certificate in Adult Literacy and Numeracy Education (Vocational /Workplace). These are professional qualifications for adult literacy and numeracy educator competence in New Zealand.

16 Table 1.2

Acknowledgement of Values, Cultural Identity and World View and Pedagogical Understandings and Preferences (continued)

Sources of Potential Bias

Acknowledgment Pedagogical

understandings and

preferences (continued)

At the management and senior administrative level of ITPs, the application of critical theory to practice, from my experience is non-existent, with the exception that some managers that I have worked with view critical theory as an idealistic approach. The imperatives for persons that hold senior management positions within ITPs roles (and I have personally been employed as one), is predominately to ‘get the job done’ with a strong student focus so that good achievement and completion rates are achieved. These imperatives are considered entirely appropriate for the positions that these managers hold, but from my perspective do little to explain why there is such a continued need for foundation education.

My experience is that critical theoretical approaches do not sit well with neo-liberal Government policy around foundation education (such as the TESs, LLN and Youth Guarantee policies) as the imperatives of recent Governments’ have been to reduce public sector costs, unemployment figures and low achievement rates in foundation level programmes as monitored by the TEC. I believe that one of the issues facing successive Governments’ is the three year term within which to achieve results, resulting in relatively short-term planning. Unfortunately addressing the systemic factors underlying the need for foundation education requires long term and generational approaches.

Table 1.3 outlines my professional experiences and personal observations with regard to foundation education gained over years of working in academic management and leadership roles within the ITP sector. Excerpts from this section were also provided in the initial correspondence with potential participants as means of communicating my personal investment in the study and beliefs about the importance of the research (see Appendix B). Through my professional experience and networks I believe I have gained a degree of ‘practice wisdom’ in translating Government policies and management decisions into operation at the four ITPs I have worked for, including the development, delivery and evaluation of foundation programmes.

17 Table 1.3

Summary of Professional Experience in Relation to Foundation Education

Areas of

My professional experiences over the last 20 years at four ITPs (including NorthTec), has included a range of responsibilities relating to academic management and leadership including: academic and institutional quality assurance; programme development, accreditation, approval, evaluation and review; people management; academic staff professional development; and staff research.

Within foundation education at ITPs

I have: facilitated the development, accreditation and approval for many generic and specialised foundation programmes; obtained accreditation and approval for academic staff development programmes specifically in the field of literacy educators; developed organisational and departmental foundation learning strategies; facilitated the process of embedding LLN into existing programmes; reviewed foundation programmes and suites of programmes; managed consultation processes for initiatives and policy as directed by Government departments such as NZQA and TEC. Through my academic management experiences including contributions to national policy directives through consultative processes, I became interested in the usefulness of ‘alternative’ pedagogical thinking to academic decision making roles within foundation education in the ITP sector.

Within NorthTec (foundation education)

My initial experience in academic management and quality assurance specific to foundation education, as a distinct educational field, was in 1999 at NorthTec. The challenges I faced at this polytechnic in facilitating the approval of centralised, generic foundation programmes sowed the seed for my interest in what I perceived as a relatively newly defined or formalised field of educational provision.¹⁴

Professional Associations

I became involved with the New Zealand Association of Bridging Educators (NZABE) in 2003 and much later in 2012 with the Foundation and Bridging Educators New Zealand (FABENZ)¹⁵. Other professional forums or umbrella groups that I actively engaged with (prior to their disestablishment) were the ITPNZ Foundation Forum and the ITPNZ Academic Managers Forum. All of these networks were invaluable for fostering discussion and debate with colleagues about the challenges in foundation education policy and practice and helped clarify the focus of this study.

Managing the tensions between the sometimes opposing philosophical and ideological stances between: Government mandate and rules; the ITPs’ governance, management and quality assurance systems and requirements; educators’ imperatives and developmental needs; students’ needs and goals; and other stakeholder expectations has been a constant challenge. From a personal perspective, nowhere has this been more apparent than at the foundation learning and/or programme level. I have also observed

14 See Chapter Two for a brief history of foundation education provision in New Zealand.

15 Formed in 2012, as an incorporated society which amalgamated the New Zealand Association of Bridging Educators (NZABE) and the Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics (ITPNZ) Foundation Forum. FABENZ exists to provide a shared platform for tertiary educators across the sector to work to promote foundation and bridging education as a means of empowering and creating success for learners, their families and communities, and for society and the economy.

18

that the pedagogical issues and conflicts in developing, delivering and evaluating foundation programmes seem to be more evident in these programmes than in other fields or disciplines delivered by ITPs. This has led me to critically reflect as to why this is the case.

From my perspective and experience as an academic manager, it seems evident that many of the tensions arise from a clash of philosophies and beliefs as to the value and function of foundation education. This tension has been observed by postgraduate researchers in this field.

The tension appears to arise from a mismatch between educator’s philosophical beliefs (of equity, social engagement, involvement in learning processes, as highlighted in personal background and practices within an environment of immense diversity of student) and institutional needs in bridging students into tertiary education. (Morgan, 2003, p. 9)

Within the actual delivery of the programmes, I agree with Benseman’s (2008a) comments in that there is more happening within the learning environment than a single minded focus on skill acquisition and attaining the desired retention and completion outcomes. This stance has also been reflected in postgraduate research conducted in the foundation education field in New Zealand.

Bridging education provision in the polytechnic sector, whilst diverse in terms of the models of delivery, is based on core operational components and philosophies…Programme quality is measured by the ability of programmes to meet their purpose, which in the polytechnic context is to assist under-prepared students to gain skills and qualifications and entry to mainstream tertiary courses.

The need for highly trained and skilled staff, in learning theory and practice as well as specific content, is reflected in bridging philosophies. These beliefs are core to bridging education delivery: bridging education must be approached holistically recognising that students are complex entities. Their learning/acquisition of skills must be seen in the context of their day to day lives, cultural heritage, and future aspirations. (Coltman, 2004, p. 7)

In the foundation education field, the intensity of this tension may be due to factors that I have observed such as: the relative newness of the field in New Zealand; the marginalisation of both educators and the target groups of foundation learners; and a

19

polarisation or dichotomy between the technicist or liberal functionalist paradigm of policymakers and those of some practitioners or educators working in the field.

Table 1.4 outlines a summary of my observations of the foundation education field in terms of: programme development; management challenges; foundation education tutors¹⁶ challenges; policy and research. The literature on foundation education in New Zealand acknowledges the value of the critical theoretical or pedagogical approach to meeting students’ needs (Benseman, 1998; Benseman, 2008a; Tobias, 2006). I have observed that most tutors are practical and outcome focussed in their delivery style, but also espouse the value of pedagogical approaches akin to Benseman’s (2008a) social action, Freirean, critical or emancipatory perspectives (see Table 2.3). However, Benseman (1998) argues that, despite Freire’s international prominence in the field of adult education, his influence on New Zealand adult education (specifically on adult literacy), has not been great especially at the level of practice within programmes.

Few, if any, current adult literacy practitioners would claim that they were running ‘Freirean programmes’. This is probably more so now in the 1990s with its managerialist ethos and New Right environment, where it can be political suicide to publicly proclaim a revolutionary intent of even modest proportions.

(Benseman, 1998, p. 23-24)

I have also encountered a few managers and educators who are adverse to the precepts of critical theory and pedagogy for given reasons such as: a degree of uncomfortableness with its radical or revolutionary connotations; a preference to focus on individual change for foundation students rather than societal or political change; and difficulties in translating perceived complex tenets of critical pedagogy into practice in the classroom.

16 Within this research the term ‘tutors’ represents foundation education tutors or educators unless specified.

20 Table 1.4

Summary of Personal Observations in Relation to Foundation Education

Area Observations

Programme development

I have observed that, unlike most mainstream programme areas, foundation programmes and courses are developed for a variety of reasons and amongst a variety of circumstances which have included:

 a need for prospective students to gain specific skills through targeted courses which have been identified previously as not being at a sufficient level of proficiency at the pathway programme. For example, pre-entry or credit bearing mathematics courses for engineering programmes;

 the need for complete specialised foundation programmes to prepare under-prepared students to gain entry into degrees such as nursing;

 institutional decisions to develop generic programmes which pool resources across the institution and aim to provide strands or pathways to a number of higher level programmes; and

 programmes that target specific communities such as Māori, Pasifika and youth.

Management challenges

From my personal experience at the management level within ITPs there seemed to be a polarisation between the technicist or liberal functionalist approach to foundation education and the more critical, emancipatory or transformational approach. This has been reflected in my observations of the proceedings of various Academic Boards and sub-committees in the development, approval and evaluation of foundation programmes.

I have also observed, over the years, an increasing influence of managerialist philosophies alongside seeming endless restructuring, retrenchment and organisational reviews within the ITP sector. I believe that this has promoted a culture of distrust between academics and management and at times between institutions and Government agencies throughout the tertiary sector. This has made the role of the academic manager increasingly difficult as it relies heavily on staff buy-in for the success of new initiatives and programmes. This is particularly true in terms of staff engagement and ownership when developing new foundation programmes, courses and associated curriculum. Often tutors who are developing the content of new programmes do this in their own time, above and beyond their teaching or research workloads.

I have also observed a degree of marginalisation of both foundation programmes and foundation educators within organisational programme portfolios and organisational structures at a number of ITPs.

Foundation education tutor influences

From my experience most individual educators do not have great influence on qualification accreditation, approval and funding rules and criteria which determine, to a large degree, a standardised format for describing the structure, content and outcomes of a programme or qualification. However, from my experience, they do tend to have a relatively high degree of autonomy in their choices around the delivery of the curriculum and level of engagement with their students.

Pedagogical challenges

Over time I have developed awareness that the development of foundation programmes requires consideration of appropriate pedagogies to meet the diverse and complex needs of foundation learners. I have observed that many foundation programmes were being developed, delivered and evaluated without an explicit conceptual or theoretical framework within quality assurance documentation, which is often articulated in higher level programmes and required at the degree level.

21 Table 1.4

Summary of Observations Regarding Foundation Education (continued)

Area Observations Pedagogical

challenges (continued)

I have had direct experience with the efforts of many managers, administrators and educators working in foundation education who intrinsically understand the need to incorporate critical or emancipatory approaches to the teaching and learning process and curriculum in order to develop pedagogically sound programmes for foundation learners. However, these educators operate within what is often perceived to be overly mechanistic, technicist or functional policy directives, funding rules and at times institutional systems and processes.

Within some foundation programmes I have observed an undue focus on functional or remedial skill acquisition within foundation programmes which embodied essentially deficit or ameliorative approaches to meeting foundation learner needs. I have also observed an institutional aversion to the consideration or articulation of explicit critical theoretical or pedagogical approaches in the design and development of foundation programmes. In working with educators in development and evaluation of foundation programmes I have encountered a more critical pedagogical approach in practice than exists within with the formally approved programme documentation. For example, in both formal and informal discussions regarding the needs of the learners within these programmes, they are more likely to use terminology that is associated with Freirean

Within some foundation programmes I have observed an undue focus on functional or remedial skill acquisition within foundation programmes which embodied essentially deficit or ameliorative approaches to meeting foundation learner needs. I have also observed an institutional aversion to the consideration or articulation of explicit critical theoretical or pedagogical approaches in the design and development of foundation programmes. In working with educators in development and evaluation of foundation programmes I have encountered a more critical pedagogical approach in practice than exists within with the formally approved programme documentation. For example, in both formal and informal discussions regarding the needs of the learners within these programmes, they are more likely to use terminology that is associated with Freirean