(An item from ISHN Member information service) An article in Issue #1, 2013 of the International Journal of Education Development uses the \\'Capability Approach\', developed by Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen, as well as a realist review to assess and explain the quality of teacher practices in Tanzania. The authors suggest that the apparent gap between perceptions (teachers are nor performing well enough vs the teachers don't have enough resources) The authors conclude that " By unpacking these components of teachers’ behaviours, and understanding the underlying structures, mechanisms, tendencies and counter-tendencies that produce certain empirically apprehended actions, we can start to see entry points in which measures to improve teachers’ professional performance could be seeded. First, interventions should acknowledge teachers’ causal mechanisms because these are the valued beings and doings that are central to the lives that teachers want to lead; if interventions could aid in the achievement of these functionings, they would also aid in the reduction of some ‘deficient’ behaviours that are associated with their constraint. Secondly, interventions need to account for and address dominant counter-tendencies (or constraining conversion factors) that teachers face, as this will ground strategies in context, provide pragmatic solutions, and convince teachers that these measures are worth trying. Without acknowledgement of causal mechanisms or counter-tendencies, it is highly likely that technocratic fixes that attempt to alter certain criticised practices will not be sustained, as teachers will revert to old ways. The reason being, these criticised ‘old ways’ are grounded in the valued functionings and conversion factors that consistently generate much of teachers’ behaviour." Read more>>
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(An item from ISHN Member information service) Several articles in Issue #4 Supplement 2, 2012 of African Journal for Physical, Health Education, recreation & Dance describe the knowledge, attitudes, beliefs and perceptions of young people in different parts of Africa. One article notes the paucity of information about STD's among students in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. Perceptions about condoms in Limpopo Province of SA was the fovus of the second article. A third article on students in that same province examined student awareness of the consequences of pregnancy. Read more>
(An item from ISHN Member information service) An article in the February 2013 Issue of PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases reviews the impact of school-based deworming programs and found that they can be effective in reducing the infection rates among those children. However, the authors caution that the overall impact of such school programs on the community may be lessened if the proportion of people in the community who are infected are adults rather than children. Really? Who would have thought that school programs do not reach adults? Really Read more>
(An item from ISHN Member information service) Scaling up (or diffusing innovations) is a major issue among others related the implementation/operation, capacity-building and systems change. The issue is discussed in an article appearing in Issue #6, 2012 of the International Journal of Education Development. The authors suggest that "Scaling-up their initiatives successfully and sustainably can be an efficient and cost effective way for NGOs to increase their impact across a range of developmental outcomes, but relatively little attention has been paid in the education sector to how best this may be done and debates appear to have stalled. One approach to scaling-up is replication, on which this paper focuses. While there is no one universally applicable path through which an educational NGO can achieve successful replication, more can be done to support choice of the best path to follow, with respect to specific NGO circumstances and the context within which it operates – and hopes to operate in future. This paper presents four known paths to replication alongside new illustrative diagrams to explore their advantages and disadvantages, and highlights the need for a fifth approach that does not appear in current literature. ‘Network replication’ is proposed as new pathway that draws on known strengths of networks and offers a learning-oriented approach to scaling-up". Read more.
(An item from ISHN Member information service) An article in Issue #6, 2012 of Policy Development Review describes a shift in thinking about monitoring and evaluation in low income countries. The article is described as "An important first step in any initiative involving M&E capacity development is the diagnosis of the systems' current status. This article presents a diagnostic checklist that captures issues of M&E policy: indicators, data collection and methodology; organisation; capacity-building; participation of nongovernmental actors; and use. It applies it to a review of the PRSP M&E arrangements of 20 aid-dependent countries in sub-Saharan Africa to demonstrate comparative strengths and weaknesses". Read More.
(An item taken from the daily/weekly/monthly ISHN Member information service) An article in Issue #8, 2012 of The International Journal of Environmental Research & Public Health provides a systematic review of the impacts of water and sanitation inadequacies in the school environment. the authors report that" Forty-one peer-reviewed papers met the criteria of exploring the effects of the availability of water and/or sanitation facilities in educational establishments. Chosen studies were divided into six fields based on their specific foci: water for drinking, water for handwashing, water for drinking and handwashing, water for sanitation, sanitation for menstruation and combined water and sanitation. The studies provide evidence for an increase in water intake with increased provision of water and increased access to water facilities. Articles also report an increase in absenteeism from schools in developing countries during menses due to inadequate sanitation facilities. Lastly, there is a reported decrease in diarrheal and gastrointestinal diseases with increased access to adequate sanitation facilities in schools. Ensuring ready access to safe drinking water, and hygienic toilets that offer privacy to users has great potential to beneficially impact children’s health. Additional studies that examine the relationship between sanitation provisions in schools are needed to more adequately characterize the impact of water and sanitation on educational achievements." Read more..
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