The qualitative phase: multiple case study approach

A multiple case study approach is an ideal methodology when a holistic, in-depth investigation is needed because it gives a picture that illustrates relationships and patterns of interaction between variables (Feagin, Orum, and Sjoberg, 1991). Gregan and Kaylor (1999:103) define this approach as taking an in-depth look at an individual, in context, a situation or an intervention, but each case also has a number of elements within it, which make up a total picture or a vignette which ‘says it all’. Multiple-case studies follow replication logic and therefore serve to strengthen the results by replicating the pattern matching, thus increasing the level of confidence in the robustness of the theory and each individual case study consists of a “whole” study, in which facts are gathered from various sources and conclusions are drawn based on these facts (Bell, 1992). The multi-site case study was undertaken in five primary schools in the Buffalo City Metro Municipality, East London, Bhisho and King Williams Town. The five primary schools were from the following contextual backgrounds: a farm school in King Williams Town, a rural school in Bhisho, a township school in East London, an informal settlement school in East London and a suburban school in King Williams Town. The determining sampling criteria was lifestyle related, as the researcher had noted that some areas were classified under certain contexts although their historical backgrounds emanated from different contexts and the lifestyles were in conflict with a description given to them. An example is that some areas are classified as farms but informal settlements have

142 ultimately sprouted around and the lifestyle is more of a township. For the purpose of this study the definitions outlined in Chapter 3 (3.4.5) are used as acceptable definitions of each context.

To ensure that the sampled school fitted the above descriptions, during the day of the interviews, principals from each school were requested to give a written and/or verbal background of their schools. Most principals opted for the verbal discussion and the researcher used that discussion as an ice breaker before the actual questions of the interview were asked. The researcher took notes whilst the principals were giving the backgrounds about their schools. The principals gave the following background about the contexts of their schools:

 Farm school: The primary school falls under King Williams Town and is classified as a public school on a private property (PPP) as it is housed on the Catholic Church premises and is believed to be a “church school” because it is regulated according to Catholic values, e.g. praying three times a day. The school is servicing 17 farming communities and the furthest is 23 kilometres away and the learners are transported by government buses to the school. Most parents are farm workers and because of the distance between the school and the communities, it is difficult for the teachers to know the home background of their learners. There is very little parent involvement in school activities. As a result there is no SGB as parents are only given one hour by the farmers to attend to school activities. Parents do not earn much and alcohol abuse is rife but to alleviate poverty the school has a government feeding scheme. In addition to their meagre earnings the farm communities survive on government grants.

 Rural school: The primary school falls under Bhisho and the village has about 30 households. Previously the community relied on agriculture and livestock but due to drought and laziness people are no longer planting their fields. Most parents are unemployed and others are working in low paying jobs like being domestic workers. Most are granny and child headed homes as the parents are either dead due to HIV/AIDS or work far from home. Families depend on government grants. Alcohol abuse is very rife and the principal also noted that they receive very little support from the parents.

143  Suburban school: The school in situated in King Williams Town.The principal reported that it is former Model C School which used to accommodate only white students but after 1994 the school started admitting other races as well. Currently most of the students are coloureds and blacks and most of the white children have moved to other schools that are still conservative. When it was still a Model C school, it used to own hectares of land, including the properties situated next to the school yard. These properties were also a source of income for the school but when the new government demanded that other races be admitted, the school board then sold the land and properties. Most parents are civil servants but the challenge is that most learners are coming from homes where parents are either divorced or single and the principal noted that these unstable backgrounds have resulted in the school having discipline related challenges. He also noted that at times he is forced to motivate that children be moved to foster homes. The school has a boarding hostel. Despite this, the principal does not see the boarding school as a solution to discipline problems as he maintains that children do not need boarding schools but homes. In the principal’s own words, “They need a personal touch”. The principal stated that because parents are working it is not easy to get hold of them and if there is a crisis they have to wait for a time when the parent is available.

 Informal settlement school: The school is in East London in an area that is regarded as a shanty town. The housing structures are shacks that are built very close to each other and the streets are very narrow. Fires are rampant and when they break out, many housing structures are destroyed and the children are left homeless. Very few people are employed and crimes like rape, theft, and drug and alcohol abuse are very common. The safety of the learners is an issue as the unemployed youth are always loitering and tend to sit on the street pavements very intoxicated. Street fights and vulgar language are the order of the day. Sanitation and hygiene are a problem as there is always a stench from sewage and dirty water thrown on the streets, and the neatness of learners is also an issue. The principal also noted that parent participation is minimal as some are working, some are not in a good state of

144 mind due to alcohol abuse and some learners are orphans who either live alone or with grandparents who cannot even walk to school.

 Township school: The school is also in East London and it is about three kilometres from an affluent suburb. The school used to be housed on a nearby farm and when the farm was sold the school was moved to the township which was previously an informal settlement. The living conditions here were unbearable and the learners would come to school scantily dressed and dirty; however, a number of NGOs have now intervened. Skin diseases and diarrhoea were very rife due to poor sanitation and the NGOs brought food, clothing and they would even come and wash the children. There was a great change after 1996, after the Reconstruction and Development Programme’s (RDP) houses were built for the residents and the principal believes that due to better living conditions, people were motivated to be civilized, and thus there was a gradual change even to the kind of learners the school received. Despite the shift the principal noted that socio economic problems are still a concern, as most people are unemployed, there are a lot of illegal taverns and the crime rate is high. As parents are working or rather uninterested, the school struggles to have a good working relationship with parents.

Schools and learners known to have indiscipline related challenges were targeted for the case study and the researcher planned that identification of problematic learners would be sourced from information from the documents provided by the schools and this was noted in the introductory letters sent to the schools. Two learners were to be purposively identified. The package consisted of the introductory letter from the researcher, the permission letter from the District Director for Education and the confirmation letter from my supervisor. The roles of the participants in the schools were also considered, e.g. people in leadership positions, (principals and members of the SMT), Disciplinary Committee members, Guidance or Life Orientation teachers and learners. These people were targeted to ensure that the information gathered was rich and representative of all levels in the school communities. In each school the researcher was allocated a venue: in the rural, township and the informal settlement the researcher was accommodated in the principal’s office, in the farm school the researcher was allocated a space in the school library and in the

145 suburban school a teacher’s office was used and the above mentioned participants were all interviewed.

The initial plan for the selection of the learners was changed, that is, learners were supposed to be “purposively identified” by the researcher by perusing the schools discipline documentation, but the schools chose the learners. Three assumptions could be given for this occurrence, the first could be that the schools misunderstood the meaning of the concept “purposively identified”, the second could be, the unavailability of the required or evidence documentation, e.g. a record book, and the third could be that schools chose to select learners that they could influence or those that schools hoped that they would not share information that would incriminate the schools. When the researcher visited the schools for interviews, the researcher was told learners were already chosen and the signed letters from parents were given to the researcher. The researcher settled for the chosen learners because the documents that were to help the researcher with the information were also not available in the schools.

In the township and informal settlement schools, the deputy principal and the HOD who were interviewed told the researcher that because the schools are mainly primary schools, they do not have serious cases thus they didn’t have minutes but only kept an incident book in which they only recorded the names of the learners but not the finer details of what the learners had done and what the sanctions were. With regard to the learners to be interviewed, schools emphasized that they had chosen learners that meet my description in the sense that the learners provided were problematic and had committed offences. They also showed me the signed letters from the parents and before the interviews could ensue and the deputy principal of the township school requested a copy of the interview responses so that she could file them. The researcher assured the deputy principal that the responses would be sent to her but because of the research ethics on the issue of confidentiality she won’t be able to get the LO teacher and the learners’ responses. The researcher proceeded with the interviews and each learner was interviewed separately.

The HOD from the township school told the researcher that their school had experienced a number of problems and is currently under mentorship so their new

146 committees and all the policies are under review, including the disciplinary policy, thus the researcher couldn’t get copies. A document with a brief background of the school was given to the researcher.

In the rural school the researcher didn’t get or see the copy of the disciplinary policy but was informed that the aspects of discipline are covered in the school policy but the copy of the school policy was also not available. The principal showed the researcher a textbook on school discipline and he noted that he was using the textbook as a guide as he was in the process of crafting the school and discipline policy. The principal also informed me that the issue of recording cases or the “green book” was never done after 1994 so they did not have a record book to record cases moreso that the cases they deal with are not very serious. For the learners that the researcher wished to interview, the researcher was told by the principal as much the school had no records, there were two “special” cases that he felt the researcher needed to look at because they were serious and entailed the involvement of the police. However, the principal was not comfortable about giving letters to parents to sign as he thought that maybe the parents would be uncomfortable or unwilling to grant permission. He noted that he was going to call five kids including those that he was targeting and he would inform them of whom the researcher was and would tell them why the researcher was interested in interviewing five learners but would start with two. The principal did so and the targeted two remained and the researcher interviewed them separately. In terms of ethical considerations there were no consent letters from parents but the principal and researcher told the learners about the true identity and the intentions of the research study.

In the farm school the principal noted that the Code of Conduct that was displayed on the wall of his office was no longer in use as they were using a SAMS (South African Management Systems) document that outlines the procedures that must be followed when disciplining learners but the document wasn’t shown to the researcher. The principal also noted that the school has a book in which they record offences which was also not shown to the researcher. The principal told the researcher that he usually sorts out the cases himself by beating the learners; he doesn’t bother to call the parents so the record book might have very few entries. After the researcher had interviewed the principal, the principal called the teacher

147 and told her to choose two learners. In his own words he said, “Madam, choose two learners, a boy and a girl, the naughtiest of them all,” and two learners were brought to the researcher and the interviews with each learner ensued.

In the suburban school a copy of the Code of Conduct was given to the researcher and the files with offence records were shown to the researcher and it was also noted that the information was also stored in the computer and managed by the school clerk. Copies of the detention forms in three different colours representing the levels of the misconduct were given to the researcher. The delegated teacher also informed the researcher that the learners were already selected for the interviews and those were learners who had already acquired three different colour forms in a term, yellow, orange and red. An old file dated 2004 consisting of the disciplinary procedures was given to the researcher to peruse. When it was the principal’s turn to be interviewed, the principal was not in a position to answer or clarify some of the disciplinary measures administered in some of the cases taken from the file, and noted that those incidents happened before his appointment at the school. The principal in the suburban school also noted that his approach is more restorative and he tries as much as he can to use the detention system that is handled by the class teachers and recorded by the school clerk. Because of the personal commitments of the SGB members, he tries as much as he can not to bother them by calling them now and again for discipline issues so he tries as much as he can to sort out issues, thus there was very little the researcher could get from the minutes recorded since his term as a school principal began.