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In the past decade there has been a notable shift in South African education policy that raises the value of school leadership as a lever for learning improvements. Despite a growing discourse on school leadership, there has been a lack of empirical based evidence on principals to inform, validate or debate the efficacy of proposed policies in raising the calibre of school principals. Drawing on findings from a larger study to understand the labour market for school principals in South Africa, this paper highlights four overarching characteristics of this market with implications for informing principal policy reforms. The paper notes that improving the design and implementation of policies guiding the appointment process for principals is a matter of urgency. A substantial and increasing number of principal replacements are taking place across South African schools given the rising age profile of school principals. In a context of low levels of principal mobility and high tenure, the leadership trajectory of the average school is established for nearly a decade with each principal replacement. Evidence-based policy making has a strong role to play in getting this right.

The Changing Academic Profession (CAP) international survey was designed in part to consider the effects of globalization on the work context and activities of academics in 19 countries or regions around the world. This paper draws from a subset of these data to explore the extent to which academics are globally connected in their research and teaching, and the ways this connectedness relates to global migration. Across multiple measures, immigrant academics (i.e., academics working in countries where they were not born and did not receive their first degree) were more globally connected than national academics (i.e., those working in the countries of their birth and first degree). Global migration by academic staff is clearly a major contributor to the internationalization of higher education institutions, yet there was no evidence these contributions led to enhanced career progress or job satisfaction for immigrant academics relative to national academics. The international expertise and experience of immigrant academics may not be sufficiently recognized and valued by their institutions.

While many universities have taken steps to recognise teaching in academic promotions, debate continues on the teaching criteria to be used and their evaluation. This article analyses the 10 criteria that inform the evaluation of teaching and eventual promotion decisions at a South African university: rationale for teaching, teaching methods, postgraduate supervision, assessment, student evaluations, peer evaluations, ongoing study of higher education, developing courses, sharing teaching experiences and special recognition of teaching. The study investigated which criteria, if any, were significant in the overall evaluation of teaching and in academic promotion outcomes for different rank levels. The unexpected key finding was that each of the criteria demonstrated statistically significant correlations and differences with both teaching evaluations and promotion outcomes. While all 10 teaching criteria mattered in the evaluation of teaching and academic promotion outcomes, postgraduate supervision and sharing teaching experiences were especially important for those who were successful at the rank of full professor. A multidimensional approach that rigorously assesses multiple criteria in evaluating teaching at all rank levels, including the professoriate, contributes to its credence and currency in academic promotions. Analyses of actual assessments of teaching criteria and their relation to promotion outcomes can contribute to consensus on evaluating teaching.

Access to current research materials, pedagogical best practices, and relevant knowledge has become problematic as journal subscription costs have increased. Increasing delays in the traditional publication timeline, coupled with high subscription costs, have resulted in a diminished ability for IS faculty and their students to access the most relevant research in a timely manner, an issue felt most acutely in developing nations. As IS educators seeks to increase the dissemination of their work and ensure that students have the most updated knowledge, one option is publishing in open-access (OA) journals. However, a lack of knowledge, inconsistent quality perceptions, the presence of predatory journals, and publication fees have negatively affected IS researchers' support for OA publishing. This study surveyed 68 IS scholars and found that IS scholars do not publish in OA journals due to concerns about fees, quality, prestige, and impact factors. This study found more similarities than differences between junior- and senior-level IS scholars, with junior faculty members placing more emphasis on the speed of publication than their senior colleagues do. By understanding the underlying reasons that IS faculty are favoring OA options, the study hopes to shed light on the reliance on traditional journal publication models that restrict the distribution of intellectual property. If the OA approach were embraced by more journals, IS faculty members and their students benefit through expeditious access to relevant content to support faculty professional development, instruction, and research.

Since 1994, the eyes of the world have been on South Africa, observing with interest the societal reconstruction project, upon which the country had embarked. In this project, higher education is both the terrain and the perceived instrument of change. In this higher education system and its mission, the academic profession is pivotal--especially, the new up-and-coming generation of academics, who have entered the profession since 1994. Using data from the International Changing Academic Profession Survey of the academic profession, this article focuses on this new generation of South African academics: their teaching; their research and service activities; their biographical details; their international profile; their relations with institutional management; and their job satisfaction. The results of this analysis reveal that while the new generation is present in terms of numbers, they also face three challenges. These pertain to three critical areas, namely research productivity, internationalisation, and the creation of a satisfying work environment, amidst signs of seriously harmful managerialism. The article concludes with recommendations as to how to approach these challenges.

In many countries publications in Web of Knowledge journals are dominant in the evaluation of educational research. For various purposes comparisons are made between the output of philosophers of education in these journals and the publications of their colleagues in educational research generally, sometimes also including psychologists and/or social scientists. Taking its starting-point from Hayden's article in this journal ("Stud Philos Educ" 31:1-27, 2012), this paper discusses the situation of educational research in three countries: The Netherlands, South Africa and Norway. In this paper an alternative for comparing research output is offered by invoking comparisons with colleagues at the international level from within the same sub-discipline. It is argued that if one would do so a different picture would emerge, even if one were to limit oneself to particular kinds of publications. The case is then made that if comparisons are regarded as a necessary part of the evaluation of an individual scholar (for appointment, promotion, tenure, and/or funding application purposes), it would be more fair to use a proxy system which is sub-discipline specific, or minimally contains some kind of correction factor in relation to the over-all quality assessment device. Debates about the relevance or irrelevance of philosophy of education in the context of educational sciences are now obscured, even poisoned by focusing almost exclusively on a particular kind of publication output. As the 'reward' system that is developed accordingly is possibly the most important driver of educational research, it puts the sub-discipline unduly under pressure to the extent that it possibly cannot survive.

Universities of Technology (UTs) offer career-focused education in a wide variety of disciplines and fields. Traditionally, UTs recruited academic staff with relevant workplace experience, rather than academic qualifications. The result of this strategy was, while many lecturers possessed professional qualifications in their field, they did not have Masters or Doctoral degrees. Much has changed over the past years. For example, most UTs now have requirements that, in order to be appointed as a lecturer, new staff should already be in possession of a Masters degree (although in several programmes this is not a viable requirement). Existing members of staff (appointed before the Masters degree was required) are encouraged to study towards higher degrees. The attainment of a Masters (and preferably a Doctoral) degree, followed by research outputs, are important considerations for promotion and notch increases. Trying to study while working full-time has many challenges, and busy lecturers undertaking this journey need various forms of support. They need teaching relief, research assistance and financial support for their research activities as well as access to resources and equipment and the support of experienced and knowledgeable supervisors and mentors. Academic staff members' perceptions and reflections on the experience of studying towards Masters and Doctoral degrees were canvassed through an institution-wide survey. In this article, we discuss the findings of the survey, and recommend ways in which institutions could support academic staff who are engaged in studying towards higher degrees. (Contains 2 tables and 2 figures.)

In a developing state, such as Zanzibar, registration of lands is not a laid-back method for the government to completely finance. Different approaches have been introduced and undertaken by the government of Zanzibar to fully reap the benefits of land registration. These however remain a myth, as what was expected from registering at least half of Zanzibar has not yielded the exact outcome. The government initiatives consist of enacting proper legislation, reforming the land policy, introducing national agendas and receiving foreign financial contribution. Based on the policies, laws and literatures, this study assessed the most appropriate framework upon which lands can be registered reliably and speedily. The qualitative data analysis method was applied, as this was purely traditional doctrinal legal research. This study used a case study design and specifically focused on the appraisal of the land registration records in Zanzibar. The targeted population for the interviews was the employees under the Commission for Lands responsible for land adjudication and registration. From the population of 195, a total of 27 officers were purposively sampled, nine of which were officers on land adjudication and the remaining 18 were on land registration. Qualitative data was analysed by narrative analysis, which seeks to understand the experiences and perspectives. The findings of the study are presented in narrative and descriptive reporting form. The results showed that the reality on the ground remains to be alarming as less than 10% of the land has currently been registered. The results further showed that the Office of the Registrar of Lands has no leading role in land registration, lack of institutional support, non-applicability of physical planning standards prior to registration, expensive land survey methods, limited application of electronic facilities, human resources and financial capacity. In order to reach the objective of the government on registering all lands of Zanzibar, this study recommends improvement of the Office of the Registrar of Lands, integrating planning standards, choosing cheaper demarcation costs and most importantly introducing electronic land registration system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study investigates the neo-customary regulation of mixed-use development and tenure in informal development around public housing (RDP housing) developments in Cape Town townships, South Africa. Informal mixed-use development occurs outside the direct influence of the state but is informally regulated through customary land management systems (CLMS). The study used an ethnomethodological research method to analyse these problems using in-depth interviews. The research results indicate that the street committees, business forums and taxi associations, all local CLMS organisations, self-regulate mixed land uses and tenure informally in the region. The street committee system replicates many other functions of local authorities, limiting the infringement of property rights and equitably distributing income. However, since membership is mostly exclusive to property owners, this system disincentivises active property development in disputed properties, enables land usurpation over property boundaries and does not accommodate tenants to an equal degree to property owners. This article was published open access under a CC BY licence: https://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The economic performance, through wildlife tourism, of African protected areas (PAs) varies widely. Though proximal management level factors responsible for economic performance and conservation outcomes are well known, underlying institutional, governance and organizational factors, which influence management regimes, have not been as extensively studied. In this paper, an institutional-economic framework forms the basis of a cross-sectional comparison of the local economic contributions of state, private, and communal PAs of the Lower Luangwa Valley in the institutionally centralized country of Zambia, and of the Greater Kruger National Park system in the institutionally devolved country of South Africa. Whereas in South Africa, private reserves neighboring the national park generate the majority of economic benefits, in Zambia, wildlife-related benefits from private and communal PAs are few relative to the neighboring national park. The contrast underscores the role of property regimes and other policies in the economic integration of public parks with surrounding landscapes. From an organizational and governance perspective, the performance of state-managed parks in both settings is tied to an ability to retain revenue, while the performance of co-governed PAs is undermined by power inequities between governing partners. These observations and their implications for policy reform are made clearer through the systematic collection and analysis of PA economic data, which our framework can guide. • Financial & economic returns from wildlife show large variation in two park systems. • This variation correlates with property & governance institutions, & organization. • Institutional & organizational mismatch undermines effectiveness of buffer areas. • Institutional & organizational alignment drives commercialization of buffer areas. • Institutional reform will require innovation and a stronger civil society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Studies of tenure security and insecurity tend to focus on the lack of tenure rights for certain groups in society. This discourse of rights is often legalistic and engenders a logical relationship between tenure security and formal tenure rights. The legal guarantee of tenure security through a title deed, for example, is couched in theories of a liberal rights-based discourse where the award of individual rights and access to mechanisms to uphold those rights are regarded as essential for the empowerment and prosperity of the poor. In South Africa, the dominant discourse in urban tenure security for shack dwellers is one of legal rights encapsulated by a freehold title deed that accompanies the award of a housing subsidy in the process to upgrade informal settlements. This approach to formalising tenure assumes tenure insecurity is experienced by shack dwellers as predominantly a fear of eviction emanating from a lack of legal rights to land and property use and/or ownership. The paper contends this top-down conceptualisation of tenure insecurity misrepresents shack dwellers' own tenure experiences and reflects an incomplete understanding of tenure security. In 2010, I conducted an ethnographic study to ask 24 shack dwellers in Durban their conceptions of tenure security as an ideal, their experiences of tenure insecurity, and the strategies they have adopted to achieve a sufficient degree of security. The study's emphasis on hermeneutical definitions of tenure offers a detailed perspective that reveals shortcomings in the conceptualisation of tenure security in contemporary housing and urban land policy. The paper offers a re-conceptualisation of the term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Housing for the world's poor and eliminating housing poverty are a major challenge particularly with the huge housing deficits in many developing countries. Slums and informal settlements are proliferating around the world as the gap between affordable housing and the individuals living in the informal economy widens. Within the current housing shortage, slum properties are often viewed as having no inherent capital value. Yet, within the informal housing developments, there is an informal property market that sees property traded and rented. This existing property market is unregulated and not transparent. This has placed a restriction on the nature of this property market and creates a new form of capital, that of 'crisylida capital'-this is capital in a cocoon state; it functions for its purpose but can neither be used as collateral nor is recognised in formal institutions. Looking at township property in Johannesburg, South Africa, informal transactions in the property market can be utilised to facilitate the creation of a property ladder that starts at informal slum and ends in formally developed property. This will move the understanding of slum property as simply a form of shelter for the urban poor to a step for housing poverty eradication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]