Department of Educational Foundations,Management and Lifelong Learning

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Exploring the responses to and perspectives on formal education among the Maasai pastoralists in Monduli, Tanzania
(Elsevier, 24-08-20) Pesambili, Joseph Christopher
Although extensive research has been conducted on education practice among the Maasai pastoralists, there has been no detailed exploration of their responses to and perspectives on formal education. Employing an interpretivist qualitative approach, this study explored various responses to and perspectives on the current practice of formal education among the Maasai in Monduli, Tanzania. The study drew primarily on interviews with two Maasai chiefs and 18 elders, as well as focus groups with 30 parents, 20 students, and 20 out-of-school morans and girls. The results revealed mixed responses to and contested views on formal education among the Maasai, ranging from positive and negative responses to the complementary response (coexistence of two knowledges). The findings suggest the need for a dialogue among various sections of the Maasai population to reach a consensus on an alternative educational option, which can work best for all segments of people in the community.
Maasai students’ encounter with formal education: Their experiences with and perceptions of schooling processes in Monduli, Tanzania
(Elsevier, 2021-03-28) Pesambili, Joseph Christopher; Novelli, Mario
Employing an ethnographic research design, this study examined the Maasai students’ experiences with and their perceptions of formal schooling processes in Monduli, Tanzania. The study drew on classroom observations, interviews with four (4) heads of schools, and focus groups with 31 teachers and 70 students. The results demonstrated the predominance of teacher-centred and rote-learning approaches, as well as poor interactions between students and teachers in the classrooms. Equally, the results revealed not only tough and challenging school experiences for the Maasai students due to the lack of support from parents, long walking distances, and the absence of midday meals but also strong cultural tensions caused by difficulties in reconciling the requirements of the traditional life with those of the formal schooling. Alongside fundamental reforms in educational policies and practices, the findings suggest the need for school-based professional development programmes, which can sensitise teachers working in Maasailand to culturally responsive curricula and learner-centred pedagogies for the Maasai students in the classroom contexts.
The World Bank’s construction of teachers and their work: A critical analysis
(Elsevier, 2022-05-23) Pesambili, Joseph C.; Sayed, Yusuf; Stambach, Amy
This article examines how World Bank (WB) policy texts discursively constitute teachers and their work as functioning according to a circumscribed set of teaching approaches, while subjugating their reflexive and autonomous professional identities. But neither WB texts nor teacher images within them provide robust accounts of the realities of teachers and their work. What emerges are tropes of policy reforms in teachers and their work arguing for greater regulations underpinned by accountability and performativity regimes. In engendering scepticism of teachers’ professional abilities, WB policy discourses reveal an ambivalence about teachers as providers of equitable and quality education: seeing them as a problem while begrudgingly treating them as a solution to the very reforms authorised in the WB policies.
Glocalised research design: exploring the encounter between Indigenous and Western methodologies among the Maasai Pastoralists in Monduli, Tanzania
(SAGE, 2021-08-10) Pesambili, Joseph Christopher
Drawing upon my experience of researching the encounter between Indigenous and Western knowledge among the Maasai in Monduli, Tanzania, I reflect on theoretical and practical aspects of a glocalised research design as an alternative methodological approach to Indigenous research. I explore how the design is embodied in the Maasai’s concept of enkigúɛ́ná (meeting) both as an ontological and epistemological framework for engaging diverse worldviews and knowledge systems in meaningful ways. The experience from the fieldwork shows that not only does the glocalised design offer possibilities for decolonising research and knowledge production but also it provides a dialogical space for co-constructing knowledge between the researcher, research assistants, and participants. The glocalised design offers new insights into the importance of research at the encounter where two knowledge systems constantly in tension, meet, interrogate, and negotiate with each other through a productive dialogue to enhance mutual understanding and create new knowledge.
An exploration into the encounter between Indigenous and Western education at Noonkodin School in Eluwai, Monduli, Tanzania
(Taylor & Francis, 2020-02-25) Pesambili, Joseph Christopher
This study investigated the tensions present in an intercultural education model designed to offer an indigenous knowledge course alongside the national curriculum at Noonkodin School in Eluwai, Monduli, Tanzania. The study employed an ethnographic research design involving mainly in-depth classroom observations, interviews with the head and deputy head of school, informal conversations, and focus groups with 11 teachers and 20 Maasai students. The findings showed that the provision of intercultural education at Noonkodin is beleaguered not only by a hegemonic relationship between Indigenous and Western knowledge, but also a strong cultural mismatch, contradiction, and ambivalence in their strictest sense. For the programme to succeed, the findings suggest the need to overcome both the hegemonic backdrop of Western education structures that shape what happens in the school, alongside the structural limitations of Noonkodin’s location within a modern Tanzanian state replete with capitalist values that run counter to its stated goals.
Implications of female genital mutilation on girls’ education and psychological wellbeing in Tarime, Tanzania
(Taylor & Francis, 2018-03-15) Pesambili, Joseph C; Mkumbo, Kitila A.K
Though female genital mutilation is widely practiced in Tanzania, there has been no systematic examination of its long-term implications on girls’ wellbeing. Employing interviews and focus group discussions, this study explored the implications of female genital mutilation (FGM) on girls’ wellbeing in Tarime, Tanzania. The results revealed that the effect of FGM on girls are multifaceted, including early marriages, parents’ negative attitudes towards girls’ education, girls’ change in attitudes and loss of interest in schooling, which lead to poor educational achievement in many ways. Notably, girls who manage to escape FGM suffer from isolation and stigma from their peers who have been circumcised. Arguably, FGM is both a protective and risk factor for girls in Tarime. FGM is a protective factor against stigma and isolation for circumcised girls, and it is a risk factor in denying circumcised girls’ opportunities for education, and in perpetuating stigmatisation for the uncircumcised girls. We have concluded that, in the absence of more positive alternative rites of passage for adolescent girls in Tarime, and despite the widespread awareness about its negative consequences, FGM is likely to continue due to its centrality in the Kuryan cultural, social and economic necessities.
Educational Accountability Relationships and Students’ Learning Outcomes in Tanzania’s Public Schools
(SAGE, 2017-08-30) Komba, Aneth Anselmo
Drawing on the literature on educational accountability and the practices of public educational service provision in Tanzania, this study explores ex ante students’ learning outcomes associated with the existing accountability relationships in public preprimary, primary, and secondary schools. The article responds to three questions: (a) What accountability relationships exist and how do they explain learning outcomes in public schools? (b) What accountability arrangements exist and how do they stimulate a focus on the desired learning outcomes? (c) What are the approaches to accountability in education and how do they explain students’ learning outcomes? The study adapted the accountability framework developed by the 2004 World Development Report. The research approach used is qualitative and informed by historical case study design. Data were collected using documents and analyzed using content analysis. The study findings indicate that the term accountability is well-documented in Tanzanian educational policies and programs; however, there is lack of clear accountability relationships, arrangements and structures to support accountability at various levels, which is among the possible factors that contribute to students’ poor learning outcomes. This study’s findings also affirm that the four approaches to accountability—financial, regulatory, professional, and participatory accountability—are ineffective in enhancing positive students’ learning outcomes. The study recommends (a) establishing clear and effective accountability policies and relationships to enhance students’ learning outcomes, (b) promulgating guidelines to engage families in their children’s education, and (c) developing an eclectic model for managing public education whereby every level of the system is answerable to the Ministry of Education.
7.18 KHuman Resource Planning in Schools and Teacher Training Colleges: The Practice in Tanzania and Implications for Availability and Deployment of Teaching and Non-teaching Staff.
(Lambert Academic Publishing, 2017) Komba, Aneth Anselmo
Drawing on the authors’ experience, the literature and statistics regarding the available human resources in pre-primary, primary, secondary and teacher training colleges, this chapter: (1) discusses the definition and importance of human resource planning (HRP) in educational organisations; (2) identifies the approaches and activities in HRP and discusses how these can be used to plan human resource use in educational organisations; (3) determines the extent to which HRP has been conducted and ensured that schools and teacher training colleges have adequate and qualified teaching and non-teaching staff; and, finally, it highlights the prospects and possible barriers to conducting effective HRP in Tanzania. The chapter establishes that HRP in Tanzanian educational organisations is poorly conducted and largely depends on the free play of the market, which has resulted in overstaffing, understaffing, uneven distribution of teachers, and an acute shortage of teachers and non-teaching staff in the studied levels of education. It concludes with a recommendation that effective HRP is the most appropriate solution to the current imbalance between teaching and non-teaching staff in educational organisations.
Relevance of schooling in Tanzania: Educational leaders’ perspectives on economically disadvantaged families
(Routledge Tylor & Francis Group, 2017) Komba, Aneth Anselmo
This qualitative research study explores educational leaders’ views on economically disadvantaged families’ perceptions about the relevance of schooling and compares these with government and international educational policy objectives in five regions of the Tanzanian mainland. The findings indicate that economically disadvantaged families devalue schooling. Five indicators supported this argument: 1) parents’ unwillingness to bear the opportunity, direct, and indirect costs of schooling; 2) parents’ reluctance to support school activities and their children’s education; 3) families’ negative perceptions regarding the value and returns from schooling; 4) families’ tendency to purposefully hinder teachers’ efforts to encourage schooling; and 5) parents’ tendency to purposefully urge their children to perform poorly in the national primary school leaving examination. The incongruences between policy objectives and how families, according to educational leaders, understand the relevance of schooling require investigation. While the policies maintain that education is a means of eradicating poverty, the families in the studied rural communities feel that their children’s educational advancement increases household poverty, is a burden, and is an irrelevant strategy for alleviating their poverty. The study concludes by emphasising the importance of the need for alignment in realising education between educational policies, implementers of the policies, and the end-users; collaboration between educational leaders, teachers, and families in enhancing children’s schooling; cultural responsiveness; and the overall quality and relevance of schooling
Analysis of the Unit Costs for the Government Provision of Pre-Primary Education in Tanzania
(journal of the School of Education, 2016-03) Komba, Aneth Anselmo
The realisation of universal pre-primary education in any country requires serious government intervention to finance it. To be able to provide adequate funds, governments require information regarding the annual unit cost of educating a child in a pre-primary class. This study uses the 2012 Tanzanian census data to determine the unit cost of providing preprimary education in public pre-primary schools in Tanzania for two years. The study employed the qualitative research methodology using a basic/generic research design. Data were collected through existing documents, observations, telephone and face-to-face interviews with head teachers and pre-primary class teachers in 260 primary schools located in the Dar es salaam and Pwani regions. The analysis was performed using the Excel program and content analysis. The findings revealed that the public pre-primary unit cost is 517,262 and 221,960 Tanzanian shillings (Tshs.) for year one of a serious implementation of the financing strategies and the following year respectively. This amount means that, for the first year of financing pre-primary education, the unit cost is Tshs. 2,666 or $1.251 for each school day and Tshs. 53,325 or $25.15 for 20 school days per month. For the following year, the unit cost is Tshs. 1,144 or $0.54 a day and Tshs. 22,882 or $10.79 a month. The paper suggests a need to finance pre-primary education on the basis of the actual unit cost. Hence, pre-primary pupils should be provided with capitation and development grants of $25 a month in the first year of the programme implementation and $10 a month in the following years.
African Flagship Universities: Their Role and Contribution to Higher Education and National Development. Case of the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
(African Flagship University Project, Higher Education Training and Development, University of Kwa-Zulu Natal and Center for International Higher Education (CIHE), Boston College, 2014) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
Aid and of Growth of Public Higher Education Sector in Tanzania
(University of Bergen, Nile Basin Research Program, 2014) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
Cost Sharing and Participation in Higher Education in Sub Saharan Africa The Case of Tanzania
(2006) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
In the early 1990’s Tanzania reintroduced a policy of higher educational cost sharing aimed at slowly shifting some of the costs of public higher education, which in recent years had been exclusively borne by the Government, towards the beneficiaries of higher education, i.e. students and their parents as well as non-governmental parties and other stakeholders. The Government’s principal objectives for reintroducing cost sharing in higher education were to: expand access/participation in higher education; make the beneficiaries of higher education contribute to its costs; recover the costs of food and accommodations; establish a legally protected students’ loan scheme; and make higher education system more responsive to the labour market needs.
Tanzania
(2008) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
Tanzania
(2010) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
Funding Higher Education in Tanzania: Modalities, Challenges, Prospects and a Proposal for New Funding Modalities
(Palgrave Macmillan UK, 2013) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
This chapter discusses (current) modalities for funding public higher education in Tanzania, as well as related challenges and prospects using as a reference point the University of Dar es Salaam — Tanzania’s oldest and largest public university — in the absence of data from other public universities. The major thesis of this chapter is that the current modalities of funding public higher education are unsustainable and unrealistic in the wake of the surging demand for higher education. Alternative sustainable models and strategies of financing public higher education — including establishing a higher education development/investment bank — are urgently needed to achieve financial sustainability. This chapter further argues that while the government has the responsibility of funding public higher education, since it is also a beneficiary, its financial ability to fund both public and private higher education, as is the practice (or malpractice) now, is limited because there are too many competing demands for government funds or because higher education is not a priority, or both. The situation calls for new and eclectic funding models.
Strengthening Higher Education Space in Africa through North-South Partnerships and Links: Myths and Realities from Tanzania Public Universities
(2016) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
Governments' cuts in research and development funding for public universities in Tanzania has compelled these institutions to establish and develop extensive partnerships and links with universities, and research centers in the North. The establishment of the North-South partnerships has also coincided with the dominance of external and heavy dependence on external donors for funding of research and development activities in the majority of Tanzania public universities. This article, using the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), public university, seeks to shed light on whether or not partnerships make any significant contribution to the institution’s capacity building. The thesis of this paper is that although N-S partnerships are instrumental in institutional capacity building; they have not significantly contributed to the strengthening of higher education space at UDSM and apparently at other public universities in Tanzania because of inherent structural imbalances and inequalities embedded in the partnerships.
Educational Equity in Tanzania: The Imperiled Promise of Reform
(Trustees of Boston University, 1999) Ishengoma, Johnson M.; Youngman, Deborah J.
As Sub-Saharan African nations struggle to create viable infrastructure adequate to the needs of their complex , polyethnic societies , it has been widely recognized that general well-being in the post independence era relies primarily on equal access to education , as deferentially defined. Pro- filed here is the recent history of the United Republic of Tanzania's efforts to educate its people. Ideological intent , theoretical merits , and practical limitations of applied strategies , including current controversial reforms endorsed by extranational organizations , are discussed
Cost Sharing in Higher Education in Tanzania Fact or Fiction?
(Boston College & Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa, 2004) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
In the early 1990s, Tanzania reintroduced a policy of higher educational cost-sharing, designed to slowly move some of the costs of higher education, which in recent years had been borne almost exclusively by the government, toward parents and students as well as toward other nongovernmental parties. This article reports research into the difference this policy seems to have made at Tanzania’s major public university, the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), with particular attention to the enrollment of privately sponsored (i.e., fee-paying) students and other changes discernable in university finances during the early years of this policy implementation. The report concludes that cost sharing in higher education in Tanzania is justified on the grounds of the sheer need for nongovernmental revenue for public higher education institutions because of the declining government appropriations to these institutions, along with the dire need to expand access to higher education; however, its implementation has been lackadaisical.
Africa Oral Traditions: Riddles among the Haya of Northwestern Tanzania
(Springer, 2005) Ishengoma, Johnson M.
This study argues for the integration of African oral traditions and other elements of traditional learning into the modern school curriculum. It thus contributes to supporting the increased relevance of education to local communities. In particular, using the example of riddles collected from one of the main ethnic groups in Northwestern Tanzania, the Haya people, the present study challenges the views of those social and cultural anthropologists who hold that African riddles have no substantially meaningful educational value. Instead, it is maintained that riddles make an important contribution to children’s full participation in the social, cultural, political, and economic life of African communities, especially by fostering critical thinking and transmitting indigenous knowledge.

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