Curriculum Restructuring in Higher Education (1999)

The first significant review of the NQF took place in 1999 under the guidance of Kraak of the HSRC and was commissioned by the National Research Foundation (NRF, 1999). The research focused mainly on curriculum restructuring in higher education in South Africa. Four key areas were covered:

Overview of the South African context

Including a ‘review of the conditions and pressures which gave rise to particular policy goals and led to particular policy strategies’ (NRF, 1999:3 and Luckett, 1999).

Review of national organisations

Organisations implicated in the development of national higher education curriculum policy development, including the DoE, SAQA, the Committee of Technikon Principals (CTP) and the South African Universities Vice-Chancellors Association (SAUVCA) (Gevers, 1998).

Case studies

A case study analysis of three NSBs: Physical, Mathematical, Computer and Life Science (NSB 10), Human and Social Studies (NSB 07), and a professionally orientated NSB (HSRC and SAQA, 1999). Case studies were also conducted at a selection of higher education institutions (Brown, 1998).

This review was seen by many as the first organised attempt from the higher education sector to question the objectives of the NQF. As was noted by Cosser et al (1999), the South African NQF was unique in that the higher education sector was included:

While HETS [Higher Education Training Sectors] abroad are reconsidering their positions vis-à-vis their national qualifications frameworks, the South African HETS is unique in being the only HETS to have been committed from the outset to realising the objectives of the NQF (1999:1).

In papers commissioned as part of the review, authors such as Luckett (1999), Gevers (1998) and Kraak (1999) highlighted a number of key concerns at that time (most of which are presently still being debated):

The current demand [for higher education institutions] to be accountable to the DoE for their educational practice and to be subjected to quality assurance is often perceived to be uncomfortable if not threatening (Luckett, 1999:1).

Gevers (1998:9) raised three broad areas of concern from the Australian and New Zealand processes:

• the NQF concept originated from the labour movement and aims primarily to improve human resource development – higher education institutions perceive this as a drift towards vocationalism and undesirable standardisation;

• rigid frameworks could have a negative impact on the diversity of higher education programmes; and

• the emphasis on outcomes are overly reductionist and behaviorist.

In response Ensor (1999) was particular critical of Gevers’ comments:

It was not clear whether Professor Gevers was at the time giving voice to SAQA’s or UCT’s [University of Cape Town] particular view… (1999:55).

It was also during this period that Badat (presently the Chief Exective Officer of the Council on Higher Education [CHE]) raised the concern that too many problematic issues were being taken for granted:

Dr. Saleem Badat of the University of the Western Cape said he had been struck by the fact that so many problematic issues were “rendered unproblematic”…What the various provisions meant for the business of teaching and learning was a “black box”. There was no conception of the human beings who were meant to be engaging in the SAQA

processes…The problematic debate around standards had been completely effaced and the curriculum and pedagogical aspects of what was being proposed had been ignored (NRF, 1999:40).

Another point raised in the report was the amount of controversy and power struggles that were associated with early NQF implementation:

Mr. Isaacs also roused considerable controversy with a comment that the NQF was not mandatory. It rested on voluntary participation, he said, and one did not have to join the NQF. “You are never going to get a summons from SAQA”. Although no one took up this

comment at the time, it was referred to several times during the next day. Prof. Naude said he had never heard of law being described in this way. Institutions had no option but to comply with the requirements of the NQF…“It could happen that in the power play someone tries to block something in an NSB,” Mr. Isaacs said. “If an NSB doesn’t do its work, SAQA can take over that function” (NRF, 1999:42-43).

The sentiments expressed by Luckett (1999) and Gevers (1998) were not new at the time, nor did they cease to feature throughout the NQF review period as noted by Allias (2003) and Fataar (2003). Even though there were brief interludes during which the voice of higher education was less prominent, the subsequent 2002 and 2003 reviews continued with a similar message, albeit in a more disguised form.

A joint HSRC/SAQA research project (HSRC and SAQA, 1999) that formed part of the NRF research included a section on Curriculum Restructuring – Shifting the power relations in knowledge production. This consideration is significant to the current research on power in the NQF discourse in that it represents one of the first signs of awareness that power relations had to be considered during NQF development and implementation.

SAQA’s initial acceptance of the NRF research initiative (see Cosser [1999] above) soon made place for a much more reserved approach. In 2000 Jansen was requested by SAQA to ‘review and assess SAQA’s concerns against the HSRC report’ (Jansen, 2000:3) – i.e. the NRF research.

Ironically, Jansen, who also participated in the workshops during the NRF process, was also recognised as one of the more vocal NQF critics:

One of the most powerful critiques of the NQF and OBE [outcomes-based education] at either of the two workshops came from Prof. Jonathan Jansen, Dean of Education at UDW [University of Durban-Westville]….He said that he had been stunned by South Africa’s faith in policy and also by the belief that policy was made by simply declaring it. Predicting that neither the NQF nor OBE would work, Prof. Jansen said policies had to “resonate with the ideas of practitioners’ thinking” in order to work. “People have to make sense of [them] in the daily grind of their work” (NRF, 1999:46).

Jansen’s meta-evaluation concluded that the NRF research did not meet the minimum required standards:

The main report fails to meet acceptable standards of evaluation and research

practice…The main report has methodological, organisational and editorial flaws that call into question the validity of several of the key findings (Jansen, 2000:11).

Jansen’s conclusion was based on a range of concerns:

• serious differences between SAQA and the HSRC about the nature, purpose and focus of the study;

• discrepancy between what is claimed to be the focus of the study;

• different understandings between the HSRC and SAQA with respect to the evaluation process;

• conceptual weaknesses and inadequacies in the report;

• methodological inadequacy of the research design and process followed during the study;

• bias against SAQA in the way that the report was written; and

• poor organisation of the report, including editing and factual inaccuracies.

As a result, the NRF report was never released into the broader public domain. This event also marked a point at which the HSRC withdrew from many of the public debates on NQF

development and implementation.