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The aim of this study was to investigate the management of parental involvement in three multicultural schools in the Umlazi District in Durban, South Africa. A literature survey resulting in a theoretical framework on parental involvement in schools, multicultural schools, and the managing of parental involvement in schools has been done. The contextual background of schools in contemporary South Africa is depicted. A qualitative research design has been used. Focus group discussions have been conducted, with a total of thirty-three principals, teachers and parents. It has found that there is a low level of meaningful contact between school and parents. Apathy exists on the side of parents, low expectations on the side of principals and teachers, and an organisational structure facilitating parent-school interaction is lacking. In managing parental involvement in multicultural schools, school managers display a lack of intercultural sensitivity.

Comparative Education as a subject or course on teacher education curricula mainly continues to be taught in Ireland, some African and East European countries and a few colleges in Ireland, the UK and several universities in the USA, Canada, Western Europe, Latin America and Australia. This research compares Irish and South African students' experiences of their Comparative Education courses. The article commences with a survey of literature on the position of Comparative Education in teacher education, a portrayal of the contextual background of South Africa and of Ireland, and a brief synopsis of the pre-course survey of students' expectations, upon which this study builds. Subsequently the research method is explained and the results presented. Three findings emerged from this study. The first is the valuable role of Comparative Education in teacher education. The second is the role of contextual factors in determining the significance of Comparative Education in teacher education. Thirdly, the centrality of clients (i.e. students) is critical to the future of Comparative Education in teacher education. (Contains 4 tables.)

As part of a research project on religion, spirituality and education, the authors attended to the role that children's divine dreams could play in religious education (RE). They contend that such dreams can indeed be used by RE teachers as the gateway to understanding the spirituality of their learners. They defend their claim by firstly developing a conceptual-theoretical framework with respect to religion, spirituality and children's divine dreams, and then presenting the results of an explorative quantitative-qualitative investigation in three schools. They find their claim to have been vindicated, and suggest that although RE teachers should not necessarily teach divine dreams "per se," they should, nevertheless, explore the possibility that (at least some of) the contents of children's divine dreams may be useful for the purpose of teaching them RE "from" religion itself, rather than teaching them only "about" religion. (Contains 1 table and 1 note.)

Religion in education in South Africa and the Netherlands: A comparative study. The aim of this article is the reconstruction and comparison of the historical evolution of the place and role of religion in education in South Africa and in the Netherlands. The article commences with an overview of the historical evolution of the place and role of religion in education, up to the present, and a discussion of the dissatisfaction and objections which could be and which have been levelled against the current situation. The Netherlands has followed a more accommodating policy and practice regarding religious beliefs and diversity than the international norm. While South Africa can learn much from the Dutch approach to the problem of religion in education, this approach has also been challenged in recent times. In both systems, controversy about the accommodation of religion in education has given rise to tension between the notions of freedom, tolerance and accommodation, on the one hand, and the acknowledgement of human rights and the need for social cohesion on the other. Other considerations to be taken into account in this regard are the downsides of providing a partisan, confessional type of education that could hinder learners in maintaining themselves in the outside world. The trend in modern society is towards individualised belief systems, not collective ones. And the warning to be heeded is that the line between education and indoctrination is thin. The current Dutch model, despite the problems that it currently encounters, could provide direction in respect of all these issues. Contribution: The article concludes with an educational-philosophical perspective regarding the question as to how educationists and educators could guide learners to a state where they can independently decide about their personal religious orientation, given the fact that they are now living in a time when relativism prevails, also in terms of religion and faith. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is twofold. It is firstly to map the international discourse and experience regarding the issue of language of learning and teaching in education. Secondly, the article focuses on the South African question regarding the issue of language of learning and teaching in educational institutions, by employing the international framework constructed in the first section for purposes of illumination, interpretation, and assessment. The language medium in education remains a contentious issue in education, also in the South African context. The comparative method that was used for doing the mapping, namely, to examine and draw potentially valuable insights and perspectives from comparable international situations, is widely used for illuminating societal issues, also in education. Schools were instituted for the first time around 3 000 BC in Mesopotamia and Egypt. During the first millennia in the history of these institutions, the dominant language of the political jurisdiction or entity in which the school was located was employed as the language of learning and teaching in schools. This was due to the political objectives of education and schooling as well as the social origins of the learners who attended the schools. Schools originated autochthonously in only a few places; most school systems in the world today can trace their roots back to the early mediaeval European prototype which was subsequently exported to the extra-European world by means of missionary activities and imperial (colonial) endeavours. It is important to keep this development in mind for an understanding of the subsequent course that the language of learning and teaching in schools followed. A departure from the mediaeval practice to use Latin as the language of learning and teaching in schools coincided with the Reformation in Western Europe in the sixteenth century, in particular the formation of nation-states in that part of the world since the beginning of the nineteenth century. The leaders of the Reformation promoted the use of the vernacular for reading and understanding the Bible, and for this reason agitated for the home language to become the language of teaching and learning in the schools. This ideal was never fully realised, however; even in Western Europe the dominant language of each nation was used as the language of teaching and learning. The notion of developing the vernacular as language of learning and teaching did not form part of the imperialist project of instituting schools in the colonies from the fifteenth century in the Americas and Asia, and from the nineteenth century in Sub-Saharan Africa. Instead, the official language of the colonial power in question was used as the language of learning and teaching in colonial schools. The empowerment of the vernacular to become the official language of the country, a hallmark of the formation of nation-states and of national education systems in the Global North, received at best scant attention or lip service when the nations of the Global South, especially in Africa (notably in Sub-Saharan Africa) and South Asia gained independence during the 1960s. The situation has since been exacerbated by the rise of English as international lingua franca in the past half century. The impact of this development can be detected in the education systems of the world, including those of the Global North: English has become a de facto universal second or third language in teaching and learning at most levels. English is also increasingly supplanting respectively French and Portuguese as languages of teaching and learning in institutions of education in francophone and lusophone Africa. This, as mentioned, is a direct result of the vernacular not having been developed and empowered to become the language of teaching and learning. The hegemonic position of English is also reinforced by widespread support for this language as medium of teaching and learning among parents. Parents are convinced that mastery of English will be advantageous for their children in the higher education context and later in the international commercial world. A plethora of scholarly investigations seem to indicate that the vernacular should be favoured as the language of learning and teaching in institutions of education. Their findings revolve around respect for human rights, including the right to use the home, mother or first language as medium of teaching and learning; the role of language of teaching and learning in ensuring that the vernacular maintains and even improves its status and currency in society; educational considerations, including the role that the mother language plays in cognitive development and the learning of the first language, the learning of a second language, and subsequently, the learning of English; also the issue of equality and equity in education, and the role and impact of the language of learning and teaching in the maintenance and production of human and social capital. In the second part of the article, the South African situation regarding the issue of language of teaching and learning is described, analysed, interpreted and assessed against the international framework outlined in the first part. The analysis and discussion presented reveal that the international considerations are valid for the issue of language of learning and teaching in South Africa as well. They also show that several contextual-ecological features of the South African pedagogical landscape cause the promotion of the vernacular as medium of teaching and learning to be of even greater urgency. These features include the poor output (achievement) levels of, and the concomitant high levels of attrition in the South African education system, the persistent unacceptably high unemployment rate, the high levels of social inequality, and the national priority of making education accessible to all. Recommendations are made as to how the development of the various vernaculars could be developed to become efficient media of teaching and learning. Two of the strategies that could be considered are to promote the use of the vernacular in teacher education, and to use some of the international aid that is being poured into the African continent for the purpose of developing the various vernaculars to grow into effective education media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The political upheavals in Eastern Europe and in Southern Africa in the period 1985 to 1995 have had serious implications for education and education systems in the countries involved. Education system experts have in the past used various theoretical tools to examine and explain the complex transformations that took place. Transitiology, social action theory and critical theory are some of these tools. An examination of these theoretical tools shows that they do not quite succeed in embracing and explaining all the factors at play in the transformations under investigation. This article proposes cultural-historical activity theory as a more suitable alternative, and illustrates this thesis with reference to the South African transition (1990 onwards). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article portrays four historically evolved ideas of a university, as they have developed in the South African context, namely the British liberal-humanistic education idea, the Afrikaner idea of an ethnically-oriented developmental university, the idea of an African university, and the idea of a university proclaimed by neo-liberal economics. The global significance of this contest, as it plays out itself on South African soil, is noted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]