LEESP task team

As noted in Chapter 2 (see Section 2.5), the NCDC is an implementing agent of curriculum policy. It is staffed with subject specialists, who work with subject panels on which teachers and other relevant stakeholders are represented, to develop

curriculum materials. The subject specialists at NCDC worked with project staff members who were recruited from Denmark to provide technical assistance. The role of this team was described by the former director of NCDC as significant in providing a forum for engagement with the project staff, so that the project was not necessarily donor-driven in terms of ideas. Some of these subject specialists served as members of the project‘s task team.

I interviewed six members of this team who were available at the time of my research. The purpose of these interviews, as stated in Chapter 5, was to understand the social process of conceptualising and disseminating environmental education. In order to understand their level of commitment to the project‘s activities, I asked them to explain how and why they became members of the task team. They said it was out of their interest in environmental education, with some adding that they represented their subjects which were, prior to LEESP implementation, designated as environmental education carrier subjects.

They said that their role in LEESP activities was to participate in the planning and facilitation of staff development workshops held for the model schools. The process of planning the workshops, as described by these respondents, involved meetings which were initiated by the project staff and held at NCDC. Members of the team worked with the project staff to implement a pre-determined work plan for the project activities. They generally felt that their input into this work plan was minimal. One respondent said that the external consultants drew up the work plan on their own, with minor input here and there from members of the task team. One respondent expressed the view that one of the project staff members was imposing ideas rather than creating an opportunity for dialogue and deliberation on the workshops‘ activities. He said:

….most of the time I was with the person [mentioning the name of the project staff] who actually wanted the programme to run the way she wanted. So, I would not say I had the power. I can say she was…. What can I say? Maybe authoritarian. (NCDC staff 5)

Similarly, another member of the task team expressed the following view:

Initially you would find that when we had a workshop, but it was for one person who would facilitate the workshops from day one up to the last day.

But another teacher educator was different. We would discuss the programme before we left for the workshop, then we shared the workshop‟s activities. The other one was so possessive. She wanted to run the whole workshop. But I raised that issue, and then after that we were included. We were not necessarily dominated but I can say we were excluded…. (NCDC staff 6)

These extracts illustrate issues of domination which might possibly have undermined the spirit of collaboration or partnership between LEESP and NCDC, and eroded the capacity building of the latter for a meaningful implementation of curriculum change. In this case the dissemination workshops were planned and run in a manner that might not have taken fully into account the contexts of schools. Carrim (2001, p.98) argues that ―[curriculum] policies are more effective when they allow for maximum participation, forcing policy to engage with people‘s lived experiences and perceived interests at the local level‖.

There was however, a different view expressed by one respondent, who felt that the LEESP task team meetings were democratic. She said that members of the team were encouraged to discuss issues rather than just to endorse the work plan. Although this respondent felt that the work plan was open to discussion, there were hierarchical relations between members of the task team and the Danish consultants. It transpired from the interviews that some professional staff at NCDC considered their participation in the LEESP activities a learning opportunity, implying that they lacked expertise in environmental education. Jansen (2001, p.279), writing from the South African context of curriculum reform, notes that the concept of participation is problematic in the sense that ―participating groups have unequal power and expertise in different policy forums, leading to different kinds of emphasis in policy outcomes‖. 7.3.2 The monitoring and research team

During the inception phase of the project, a monitoring and research team (MRT) was established by the project staff in consultation with the NCDC. The inclusion of the MRT was not originally provided for in the project document. It was added with the aim of monitoring and critically supporting the project as it unfolded. Initially the team was composed of two representatives from each of the key stakeholder institutions namely, the NCDC, ECOL, Inspectorate, LCE and NUL. However, even

before the team started its operations, some members did not show up, while others withdrew from the team for reasons which, according to two respondents, included a feeling of being discriminated against by a member of the project staff. In an informal discussion, one respondent made the following complaint to express her feelings:

When we were in Qacha‟s Neck I was restricted as to the type of accommodation and food I wanted. I slept in a very dilapidated B&B while the project staff member slept in a hotel.

Another person who withdrew from the team said that she also felt discriminated against, as she and a colleague from her institution were not remunerated, whereas the two other members of the team from the University were paid for the time they spent on project activities. At the time of the project, the institution where this member was employed was a government department within the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET). As such, the employees were regarded as civil servants, and in terms of civil service regulations they could not claim any extra payment for work done in the ministry.

The team ended up effectively comprising four members, one person from NCDC, one person from LCE and two from NUL. One of the members of this team had a PhD in environmental education, and he had been one of the consultants who developed the project proposal. His expertise and experience in developing the LEESP project proposal might have added value to the project‘s implementation. However, a lack of representation of other stakeholder institutions posed a threat to the successful implementation of the project. As reported in one of the records of the Project Steering Committee (PSC), some members of the PSC raised the concern that some stakeholder institutions were not represented in the team, and they urged the project to try to ensure that each stakeholder had representation (Minutes of 17th January, 2003). In spite of this, the team of four remained as it was until the end of the project. I was a member of this team, representing – together with a colleague – the Faculty of Education at the National University of Lesotho. As a team we monitored and evaluated the conceptualisation and staff development workshops that were held for stakeholders and model schools, respectively.

I interviewed the other three members to find out how they were recruited for the team, and also to gain an understanding of the nature of the social interaction that

characterised EE conceptualisation and dissemination workshops. For purposes of reference, these team members are designated MRT1, MRT2 and MRT3. As illustrated by the following interview statements, their appointment to the team was based on various factors, including a perceived interest in environmental education:

I was nominated by LCE (Lesotho College of Education) to represent it. Having returned from school where I was doing EE, the college felt that I could be the better person to represent it. (MRT 2)

I joined because it was part of my work. There had been before me one person who had been asked to be a member of the team, mm... two people actually before me. The other one had other things to do. So I was asked to join. Any body from our office could become a member of the team. (MRT3)

The inclusion of a monitoring and research component in the LEESP operational structure was seen by one member of the team as an opportunity to contextualise LEESP‘s ideas through collaboration and critical engagement with the project staff. He said that from their observations of conceptualisation and staff development workshops the team produced conference papers, one of which was published in a reputable international journal. These papers were written jointly with the project technical advisor. The interview extract below shows how the co-authoring of these conference papers, in the view of the respondent, was valuable to the LEESP project.

in developing those papers there would be engagements with ideas very critically …. And one would believe that through those engagements the project coordinator (referring to the Danish technical advisor) became aware of some of our ideas and critical input. His coordination alerted other project staff. But that does not mean the project became what we wanted it to become necessarily, because it also had its own ways of operation. (MRT1)

Thus while the inclusion of the MRT in the LEESP activities created a ―political space‖ (Hodgson & Spours 2006, p. 690), allowing local experts to influence the implementation process of the project, only limited input into the project‘s operations was possible. Does this suggest that the project activities did not pay sufficient attention to the MRT‘s perception of the local contexts?