Leveraging Teacher concerns in Educational change: a Case of the Uganda lower secondary curriculum reform

Abstract

Teacher concerns are the pulse of educational change. Scholarship on various educational change endeavours across sub-Saharan Africa identified inattention to teacher factors as a major cause of failure to achieve intended educational outcomes. The theoretical framework for this study: the Concerns Based Adoption Model, avers that change facilitators must acknowledge the personal dimension of change represented by teacher concerns. This study therefore sought to determine how teacher concerns in the Uganda lower secondary curriculum reform can be leveraged to facilitate an effective educational change through an exploration of the relationships between curriculum reform strategies (CRS) utilised by the change facilitators, the concerns of teachers (TC), and quality of curriculum implementation (QI). The study objectives were to: analyse the concerns of teachers implementing the Uganda LSC reform; determine the extent to which TC mediated the relationship between CRS and QI; explore selected change facilitators’ perceptions of CRS, TC, and QI; appraise the CRS and their influence on TC and QI in selected schools; and elaborate upon the patterns in TC and the relationships between CRS, TC, and QI of the LSC using themes distilled from the qualitative data. The research population was all secondary school teachers in Uganda. Located within the pragmatic worldview, the study employed a mixed methods case study design by using a convergent parallel mixed methods design in the initial phase, followed by a multiple case study. Data for the initial phase were collected through a questionnaire and interviews, and in the second phase through interviews, lesson observations, and document analysis. The initial-phase sample comprised 387 teachers selected by cluster random sampling from 44 government secondary schools in Central Uganda. Four MoES and five NCDC officials were purposively-selected for interview. Subsequently, two instrumental cases were identified from which ten teachers and four school administrators were purposively- selected for interviews. Data from the quantitative phase was analysed descriptively and inferentially; and that from the qualitative phase, thematically. Quantitative and qualitative datasets were integrated through narration and joint display analysis. Quantitative results revealed that the group concerns profile of the respondents was that of a disinterested negatively-disposed non-user. Further, negative perceptions were found on most of the indicators of CRS and QI. Mediation analysis revealed a significant effect of CRS on QI in the presence of TC (β= 0.644, t=18.576, p< 0.001), but no significant mediating effect of TC on QI (β= 0.019, t=0.959, p= 0.337). Hence a direct-only non-mediating effect was inferred. Qualitative findings from interviews and multiple case studies confirmed and expounded these results by underscoring the various school-level challenges facing teachers including inadequate infrastructure, big classes, inadequate training, and insufficient supervisory support. It was concluded that teacher concerns and hence implementation quality were most influenced by the school socio-economic contexts hence they were best-leveraged at this level. It was recommended that the MoES and NCDC incorporate contextually-generated teacher concerns into the curriculum management process to ensure effectiveness of planned reforms.