Challenges faced by curriculum advisors when offering curriculum support to schools in rural South Africa

Abstract

Many stakeholders have severe concerns about providing curriculum support to schools. South African districts have minimal authority beyond planning and focusing objectives on district settings, but they are in charge of implementing all areas of educational operations, including curriculum, funds, and resources. Curriculum support has come under scathing criticism from teachers and principals who describe it as difficult and unsustainable. From a qualitative standpoint, coupled with the case study research design, this study used a purposive sample to select 15 (n = 15) participants. Data were collected through literature reviews and the application of semi-structured Key Informant Interviews and analysed using Thematic Analysis. The results of the study include understaffing of curriculum advisors, heavy workloads, incompetence, a lack of skill and pedagogical training that are requisite for the task, and a time constraint to handle curriculum challenges. This paper aims to investigate challenges faced by curriculum advisors when offering curriculum support to schools in the Waterberg District in the Limpopo Province of South Africa. This study concludes that adequate operational resources should be made available since they can improve everyone's access to high-quality teaching and learning resources. It is recommended that adequate funding be made available to address the district's financial issues so that curriculum advisors can easily provide curriculum support.

A model to reconstruct lecturer dilemma in balancing research and teaching responsibilities: A case of one rural university in South Africa

“…In South African rural universities, lecturers often find it difficult to balance their research and teaching responsibilities (Du Plessis & Mestry, 2019). These universities are typically under-resourced and have limited facilities for conducting high-quality research (Rammbuda, 2023).…”