Abstract

This project will establish an educational research awards scheme for Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. The scheme will provide further training for educational researchers, chosen on competitive basis in the participating countries. In addition to training, which incorporates all stages of the research process, the awardees will receive research funds to undertake research on priority issues in education. The project will be coordinated and implemented at national level by local researchers in consultation with a regional coordinator, the aim being to make the training and research undertaken relevant to the needs of each country and to ensure quality outputs of the funded activities. The scheme will utilize the existing local research capacity to build, strengthen, and expand the prevailing national capacities. Twenty quality research reports will result from this project for dissemination to policymakers, researchers, and educational practitioners. The project will ensure national and regional cooperation, sharing of experiences, and networking among educational researchers.

Post-Project Summary

A series of training workshops with emphasis on qualitative research methods were carried out in Europe, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The training was demand-driven, based on issues arising from problems encountered by the awardees in their individual research projects. At the workshops, awardees and resource persons shared their experiences through group discussions and practical exercises. Nineteen research projects were supported and summarized in a monograph published by IDRC and the German Foundation for International Development (DSE). Projects are grouped under the broad headings of "Gender," "Attitudes" and "Technical/Vocational Education." Under "Gender," subjects include: parental involvement in early childhood reading; women's access to higher education (Zambia); factors contributing to low achievement in mathematics (Malawi); women in male-dominated courses (Zambia and Zimbabwe); teacher effectiveness in lower primary school (Malawi); and ethnic relationships at the University of Zimbabwe. Under the second topic, "Attitudes," researchers investigated the impact of stone extraction for commercial carving on the environment (Zimbabwe); the use of indigenous languages as the medium of instruction in primary schools (Malawi); parents' attitudes toward the use of indigenous languages in primary schools (Zambia); secondary schoolgirls' attitudes toward mathematics (Zambia); and student perceptions of the qualities of effective teachers (Malawi). Studies on "Technical/Vocational Education" included an investigation into behavioral change in technical students after their industrial attachment (Malawi); the importance of libraries in learner-centered education (Zambia); the effect of nutritional status on the classroom performance of grade four students (Zimbabwe); gender differences in career aspirations among secondary school students (Malawi); the role of technical/vocational education in the development of the informal sector (Zimbabwe); factors affecting student performance at the Malawi College of Distance Education; and parental involvement in caring for cerebral palsied children (Zambia).

Recipient Institution(s)