The Responsiveness of Teacher Education Managers at an ODeL College to Resilience and the Well-Being of Staff Working from Home During COVID-19

Abstract

<p style="text-align: justify;">The Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has increased anxiety and stress among teacher education managers and has given rise to the question of whether they have the competencies to execute their operational responsibilities productively. The theories of resilience and transformational leadership underpin this study in which teacher education managers’ resilience and their responsiveness to the well-being of staff executing their operational practices in an open distance e-learning context were explored. A qualitative approach was adopted and virtual video conferencing interviews with teacher education managers were used to explore how they mitigated their strategic and operational roles and their managerial functions to ensure the well-being and organisational performance of staff working from home. Results revealed the experiences of distance managers to have been positive in that they implemented organisational strategies to mitigate the challenges faced to ensure wellness and performance among staff working from a distance. Further research applying a mixed-method design should be undertaken to determine how resilient managers and staff working from home are. That may yield different results.</p>

Principals' managerial role in realizing the ideal curriculum and learning: The case of remote areas schools in Indonesia

“…Firstly, they must ensure the adaptation of the curriculum to suit the needs of remote learning, integrate technology, and provide equal access for all students (Nurabadi et al, 2022;Wyk et al, 2021). School principals need to monitor the quality of online teaching and offer training for teachers.…”

“…As was the case during the Covid-19 pandemic, with the limited conditions of one-roof schools, principals were required to think creatively and innovatively to overcome the existing limitations, especially regarding the implementation of learning (Freeman, Robinson, & Bastone, 2020;Wyk et al, 2021). Principals can appeal to teachers to apply practice-based learning (Heystek & Emekako, 2020;Slavit, Nelson, & Lesseig, 2016), which is done as a way to overcome the issue of students who have low motivation to learn.…”

Exploring Teachers’ Digital Literacy Experiences

“…The expansion of distance learning due to COVID-19 has brought about many changes to the educational field, but distance learning that was conducted in response to the emergency conditions of the pandemic brought numerous problems to light, such as lack of infrastructure (Kruszewska et al, 2022), difficulty in using digital devices Shagiakhmetova et al, 2022), limitations in using teaching methods (Shagiakhmetova et al, 2022), and challenges in equitable evaluation (Jung et al, 2020). In particular, elementary school students experienced more challenges in adapting to distance learning compared to middle or high school students, so elementary school educators were required to demonstrate greater capacities in designing, implementing, and assessing distance learning (Ben-Amram & Davidovitch, 2021;Taimur et al, 2021;van Wyk, 2021;Wang et al, 2021).…”

Lecturers’ Experiences of the Blurring of Work and Home Boundaries During the Covid-19 Pandemic at a South African ODeL University

“…The Covid-19 situation created different dynamics to the work-home boundaries because not all the lecturers had access to relevant resources to effectively manage their work-home interface. Within the South African context, some of the main challenges of working online are load-shedding, data and connectivity (Van Wyk et al, 2021). To add to this, the schools and early childhood education centres also closed because of the pandemic, resulting in many lecturers having to manage their childcare duties while simultaneously having to perform work duties such as research, teaching and learning and the effective support of students from their homes.…”