Educational policy reforms between 1966 and 1980

Between 1966 and 1980, the First Five-Year Plan (1965-1969) (Nyerere, 1973), which was a continuation of The First Three-Year Plan, was adopted to prepare the workforce for national development and poverty eradication (Nyerere, 1974). This plan coincided with a radical shift in political and social ideology through the 1967 Arusha Declaration (Nyerere, 1968) that introduced the Education for Self-reliance (ESR) policy (Cooksey, 1986; Nyerere, 1967). These policies emphasised the centrality of public and private sector participation in education, and CR production and distribution were eliminated

for being exploitative (Mushi, 2009). ESR was adopted because “there was no significant changes in the goals and objectives of education” (URT, 1995b, p. ii) and

curriculum between 1961 and 1965. ESR objectives and implementation were politically and legally reinforced through The 1969 Education Act (URT, 1969) and Musoma Resolution of 1974. The latter emphasised Universal Primary Education (UPE) (Biswalo, 1985), hoping to integrate education with work to produce self-reliant graduates to join a largely rural community. The resolution categorically stated that secondary and higher education should construct knowledge and skills to prepare graduates to assume middle and high level jobs for the economy (Mushi, 2009). Between 1970 and 1974, less emphasis was put on secondary education compared to primary and adult education. The management and administration of the latter were decentralised to empower local authorities (URT, 1995b), although resources were still organised and controlled at the regional and district levels.

ESR policy had less fundamental reforms in the secondary curriculum. This is

because, for example, ‘Social Studies’ curricula contents and pedagogy continued to

the former USSR, as well as the former colonial states (URT, 1996a, 1996d). This was observed by an English Language panel that met in 1973 to revise the English Language curriculum, which noted the “irrelevance of the Cambridge Literature syllabus” (Vella, 1973, p. 15) and reviewed it. However, this revision was still irrelevant because most English Literature contents and textbooks were those that were published in Europe and continued to shape colonialist powers and ideology among students and society. No such textbooks were from Tanzanian contexts, and some of them are still in use today (URT, 1996c, 2010c).

Further, the ESR was highly misinterpreted and criticised by some teachers, students, and the community (Lema, 1973). For them, Lema argues, ESR meant “farm

work” (p. 34), and students spent many hours in farming. For some less motivated students, farming was an opportunity to abstain themselves from classroom lessons (p. 35). For private school students, it meant a “substitute for school fees” (p. 34). For

parents and the community, it meant ‘manual work’, and those with negative attitudes against manual work highly resisted. Thus, ESR perpetuated colonial education policy

and failed to develop students’ critical and independent minds that would empower and

eliminate “attitudes of inequality, intellectual arrogance and intense individualism among the young people” (Nyerere, 1968, p. 54).

Yet, although ESR encouraged schools to prepare children for self-reliance, between 1967 and 1985, the state economy and education sector increased its dependence on major socialist countries for economic and education financing (Yeager, 1982). These countries were China and the former USSR (Yeager, 1982). Further, as Yeager argues, during the 1980s, this dependence shifted to the World Bank, Sweden, Norway, and the Netherlands: “Tanzania remains heavily dependent on the caprices of its trade and aid partners. National interests may be determined in Dar es Salaam, but the pursuit of these interests is constrained by decisions taken in more powerful

capitals.” (p. 104). This contradicted with ESR and Tanzania’s Non Alignment foreign policy. With this dependence and the above problems, coupled with low educational demands rooted in low income, the publishing industry in Tanzania remained small (Altbach & Kelly, 1988).

In 1963, the Institute of Curriculum Development (ICD), under the Ministry of Education, was established (URT, 1995b). ICD guaranteed and coordinated the quality of the school curriculum at pre-primary, primary, and secondary schools and teacher

training levels. However, its functions were redefined from designing, developing, testing, reviewing, and/or revising curricula.

Between 1966 and 1977, textbook production and distribution continued to be under the foreign-controlled EAPH in collaboration with TPH (Mcharazo, 2002). However, according to Mcharazo, after the collapse of the East African Community in 1977, school textbook publishing in Tanzania hardly took place because EAPH lacked a branch in Tanzania other than sales offices. Further, Tanzania Elimu Supplies (TES), a government organ established in 1967, distributed school CR (Mcharazo, 2002). Thus, after 1977, TPH was the main book publisher for all schools and education colleges. However, in this period, private commercial publishers emerged, with few owned by government religious civil society institutions (Mcharazo, 2002).

Between 1966 and 1980, school textbook publishing and distribution were monopolised and centralised by government. In this period, all schools used a single textbook for each subject. This centralisation and monopolisation controlled school curriculum content through textbook standards, content objectivity, and fact correctness (Altbach, 1989, 1992, 1996; Altbach & Kelly, 1988; DFID, 2011). This was possible because trained curriculum experts, who were mostly experienced schoolteachers, developed textbooks. However, monopoly and centralisation led to poor quality textbooks; demotivation among state publishing companies to correct textbook errors; poor physical production quality; irregular, incorrect, and unproductive book distribution due to under-funding; school complaints about supplies; and poor financial management (DFID, 2011; URT, 2004h). According to Albatch (1992), because of problems, state textbook production and distribution in most developing countries collapsed at the end of the 1980s.

The 1969 Education Act was repealed by the 1978 Education Act (URT, 1978), which centralised school administration and introduced a Commissioner for Education position. The commissioner was responsible for the establishment, coordination, and regulation of new schools (URT, 1978). Furthermore, the Act centralised school curricula and syllabi production under ICD.

The 1978 Education Act re-established School Boards for secondary schools to oversee school administration. The Act also established The Inspectorate Department at the Ministry headquarters, and at regional and district levels for the monitoring and evaluation of school and college activities. Finally, the Act made the registration and

licensing of teachers compulsory. Thus, all teachers in the country were registered, and those who had no formal training were licenced to teach in schools.

In the 1970s, Tanzania also experienced some local, national, and global crises, such as deterioration in terms of trade, agricultural stagnation, increases in the price of oil, and the Tanzania-Uganda war that culminated in weak, government fiscal policies (Lugalla, 1995; Meena, 1991). According to Meena, these crises affected the economy as well as the education sector, leading the country to borrow from the World Bank and IMF and selling the government’s gold reserves to finance social services. However, borrowing from IMF was associated with conditions imposed through programmes, such as the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), which I discuss below.