This paper reviews thee mediating role of indigenous languages in vocational skills and national development in the Zimbabwean context. In the wake of the current outcry for jobs, employment creation and entrepreneurship the need for new strategies to revive industry by focusing on community resources has become imperative. Youths need to turn to themselves as repositories of skills required for operationalising dormant and fledgling industries. In pursuit of this new strategy they need the expertise of local artisans. The initiative, adopted in the spirit of national consciousness, should yield an indigenous brand of technology. It is from this perspective that the paper argues for a fresh, broader approach to youth training, through the identification of a national programme that encourages skilled artisans to use indigenous languages as vehicles for imparting industrial skills to out of school youths. The envisaged formal programme can be implemented through the identification of industrial bases that would tap the industrial skills of out of school youths, under the tutorship of local skilled artisans. For more effective implementation the proposed blueprint argues for the liberalization of instructional media. Trainers and trainees would switch on to their preferred language in skills’ acquisition. Such a flexible project, sustained through collaborative engagement, between skilled artisans and youths, would go a long way towards enhancing the latter’s creative potential, by fostering familiarity with the terminology required by a particular industry. Further, the article envisages learners’ progressive training programmes that motivate vocational training graduates to apply modern technology to productive processes demanded by the respective communities. The study concludes by emphasizing that the achievement of national goals for entrepreneurship and youth empowerment/employment requires the adoption of new strategies encapsulated in the Education 5.0.blueprint.
Gender equality in education and training can be achieved only if curricula at every level of the system become gender-sensitive. The present study examines the extent to which the milieu at one agricultural training college in Zimbabwe promotes the implementation of gender-sensitive training. The main investigative question posed was as follows: To what extent is the agricultural education and training curriculum used at the college gender-sensitive? By responding to this question, the study provided some response to the performance, challenges and prospects for gender mainstreaming in the college’s agricultural education curriculum. Data for this study were generated by document analysis of policy, curricular and instructional documents, interviews with 12 college lecturers, four college administrators and selected final year students, and by lesson observations. The study revealed that while government, and to a lesser extent college policies, articulate the need for gender equality, little attention is paid to these invocations in practice. Likewise, agricultural education and training curricula, training techniques, learning-support materials and out-of-class activities reflect minimal attention to issues of gender equality. The article concludes by discussing possible interventions that correspond to these findings.
While globalization seems to be the buzz word and an unavoidable ubiquitous phenomenon, it has mainly taken an economic face while other pillars of development lag behind. A distinct area is the social tolerance particularly language and culture. Cultural exchange programs have remained beneficial to satisfy tourist anxieties. The nagging question is, are world systems linked to accommodate citizens from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds? If so, why do we continue to promote certain languages at the expense of others? What needs to be done? Why should we promote indigenous languages? How best can it be done? This paper attempts to unravel the issue of sustainable globalization from the lenses of a language planner focusing on empowering African languages. In the discussion, it is argued that sustainable globalization should include soft issues of development like language planning because language is the soul of any community.
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