Sunshine School Background

Sunshine is a primary school in a historically ‘coloured’ township in Soweto, south of Johannesburg. The racial division is as a result of the apartheid era, when the demarcation of society and the distribution of privileges were different. For example, ‘coloured’ people had better privileges than that of the Black community. Although most ‘coloured’ people speak Afrikaans, English is chosen as a language of learning and teaching (LOLT) at Sunshine. This formerly ‘coloured’ school, like the former Model C schools and the former Indian schools, now open their doors to admit learners from Black areas, where these schools are considered able to offer better education than schools in their own environment.

The school starts from Grade R up to Grade 7 and serves mostly children from the ‘coloured’ community, but also accommodates Black learners from two neighbouring informal

settlements. It caters to a complex variety of learners from different linguistic and socio- economic backgrounds. For most, English is a second, third or fourth language; this is also

141 the case for the teachers. Christie (1998) research shows that many Black parents would rather have their children taught in English, as they think it will afford them better opportunities when they have completed their education. One of the head of departments (HODs) mentioned that parents choose to bring their children to Sunshine because it is

considered better schools in their immediate environment, with regard to good attendance and discipline.

The principal had held his position for only two years when data for this research was collected, but other school management team members and teachers had been at the school longer. The school management team includes the deputy principal, and three phase or subject head of departments (HOD). One is HOD of the Foundation Phase (FP), and two of the Intermediate phase (for language and maths/science). There are also five support staff involved in various administration and maintenance duties.

6.3 Data collection

After failing to get the other two schools that would make the sample of this research study a balanced demographic representative of the population in South Africa, I looked for and visited a few schools in the previously demarcated ‘coloured’, Indian and Black areas to invite them to participate. Although I live in Eldorado Park, I did not know about Sunshine. My daughter was doing teaching practice at the neighbouring high school to Sunshine; that is when I learned about it. I visited the school, introduced myself to the principal, and explained the purpose of my research. After the principal asked me a few questions, he completed the questionnaire used for the pre-selection of schools for this current research and gave me

142 permission to conduct research at his school. I visited the school a few times before I could interview teachers at Sunshine. The delay came because after granting me permission, he never conveyed the information to the school management team or the teachers. Because he was not always at school, it was difficult to engage with teachers without his presence.

It was after a third week of visiting the school to start with interviews that the principal assigned one of the heads of department (HOD) to made arrangements for me to begin collecting data. This arrangement made it possible for me to successfully interview the two focus groups, the HODs, the deputy principal, and the principal, who was last to be

interviewed. Unlike everyone else I interviewed as this school, I found that during my interview the principal was at times not very professional. For example, during the interview we were disrupted by long telephone calls. One of these calls was clearly of a highly personal nature, and I was not sure whether to leave the room or not. I stayed because I could not anticipate how long the call would be, and because he did not indicate that I should step out for him to continue with the conversation. An interview that could have taken forty-five minutes to an hour went on for almost two hours. In his responses it sometimes became obvious that his line of thought was interrupted. This behaviour made me feel that he was not professional and disrespectful, since a time for this interview had been arranged prior to my visit. At the end of the interview he was supposed to give me example data, as evidence of how data is presented before it is sent to the district. For some reason he could not find them, and I was asked to collect them from the secretary when I passed by the school. I went to the school twice; the principal was not in and the secretary did not know anything about what I had to collect. This made it difficult to know whether he was willing to let me see the information requested.

143 Unlike other schools I engaged with, at this school I never had a chance to interact with teachers informally in the staffroom. Possibly because of the cold weather, they spent time in their classrooms near the stoves. My observations in other schools enabled me to see extent to which teacher and school leadership interact informally. I only observed a formal gathering of school management team (SMT), and another with the entire staff, on one of the mornings I came into the school. I learned that these are brief meetings held every morning to keep teachers informed of new circulars and other relevant information. In explaining the purpose of the meeting, the principal said:

And with that, we have the teachers busy on a constantly basis, we’re having a briefing session every morning for fifteen minutes. And communication is one of the key factors when it comes to education. So I believe in constant communication with our teachers, because with the changing of curriculum and things like that, you need to inform them on a daily basis. Instead of just having one staff meeting per term, everything gets forgotten at the end of the day. (Principal)

Other meetings that were mentioned were those between HODs and teachers in their subject areas. These are said to happen quarterly, when they view data collected for a term or semester. In their responses they mentioned that in some of their meetings they plan lessons and activities, as well as discuss and moderate assessment questions.