SARiHE Project Overview Final Colloquium 29th May 2019, - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

So Southe uthern rn Afric frican an Rur urality ality in in Highe igher r Educ ducatio tion n

SARiHE Project Overview Final Colloquium

29th May 2019, Johannesburg Sue Timmis, Patricia Muhuro, Kibbie Naidoo

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PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS: SUE TIMMIS

University of Bristol

THEA DE WET

University of Johannesburg BRENDA LEIBOWITZ (2016 - April 2018) University of Johannesburg

CO-INVESTIGATORS: EMMANUEL MGQWASHU

Rhodes University

PATRICIA MUHURO

University of Fort Hare

SHEILA TRAHAR

University of Bristol

LISA LUCAS

University of Bristol

GINA WISKER

University of Brighton

KIBBIE NAIDOO

University of Johannesburg

The SARiHE project has investigated how students negotiate the transtion from school and home in rural contexts to ‘university learning’ A focus on ived spaces, practices, artefacts

• 1. How learning in rural contexts helped or

inhibited students’ negotiation of the transition into and through higher education

• 2. Challenges for students from rural areas facing

HE curricula which remain imbued with colonialism

• 3. How can we develop inclusive and living

curricula, building on the experiences of all students, including those from rural contexts?

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• Social encounters in which the positions of those taking part matter,

they are socially and culturally organised and located in particular times and places.

• Historical phenomena -shaped by activities of participants
• How we act when encountering and participating in new ‘figured

worlds’ gives rise to and shapes our identities

• Positional identities - ‘day-to- day and on the ground relations of

power, deference and entitlement, social affiliation and distance – with the social-interactional, social-relational structures of the lived world’ (p 127).

• Figurative identities - ‘the stories, acts and characters that make the

world a cultural world’ (p 127).

• Improvisation – the interplay of habitus and agency

Identity and agency in figured worlds (Holland et al, 1998)

Allows us to explore the influences

• f the rural figured worlds upon

the new worlds of higher education and the improvisations students make

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• Decolonisation – ‘a complexly

mutating entity’ (Mbembe, 2016, 32)

• Mgqwashu (2016) - grand narratives,

including that of “decolonisation” tend to silence “local narratives”.

• Decoloniality - dealing

decisively with colonial vestiges in knowledge generation traditions and knowledge itself, psychological enslavement and a sense of unworthiness engineered for many centuries

• ver the colonised through

colonial institutions such as schools and universities (Ndlovu-Gatsheni, 2014).

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• ‘Centring Knowledge in Relation to Place’ – centre the knowledge

in the curriculum by focusing that which is most familiar or relevant to people, ..in the case of Africans, African Knowledge’.

• ‘An Ecology of Knowledges’ - students would be required to

become ‘multi-lingual then multi-epistemic’ so that ‘students would need to become proficient in a range of knowledges, and have an appreciation of their purposes and relevance.

• ‘Decolonising Knowledge from the Outside’ – students from

different social locations come together to learn – with some uncomfortable learning experiences.

Non-hegemonizing Approaches to Knowledge (Leibowitz, 2017)

Southern African Rurality in Higher Education

INSTITUTIONAL CONTEXT

Cooper (2015) classification of HEI in South Africa

• University of Johannesburg

Urban comprehensive Balanced focus on research, teaching and technology

• University of Fort Hare

Rural, previously disadvantaged Teaching-led

• Rhodes University

Only research – intensive university in a rural area,

Historically white university, previously advantaged

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• ‘Co-researcher model of

participation’ in a ‘community of inquiry’ (Timmis & Williams, 2013)

• Participatory research – is a

‘decolonising mode’ (Bozalek, 2011), as it avoids a deficit positioning

• f students.
• Narrative Inquiry principles
• Unit of analysis - practices
• Data generation with co-

researchers

• Longitudinal (April to Dec 2017) at 3

sites (UJ, Rhodes and Fort Hare)

• Approx 24 students from STEM and

Humanities at each site (72 in total)

• Seven data generation sessions

(plus external settings)

• All co-researchers given an ipad –

producing multi-modal artefacts (Evernote)

• 2 day collaborative data analysis

and publishing initiative

• Data generation with Academics

and Senior Managers

Methodology

Southern African Rurality in Higher Education

Methodological Reflections

• n using participatory

methodology in the SARiHE Project

Sampling strategy

Southern African Rurality in Higher Education

ATTRIBUTES OF PARTICIPATORY METHODOLOGY

Multimodal Methods

Southern African Rurality in Higher Education

DATA COLLECTION

• Selection of co-researchers – snowball sampling using the matrix

(first presentation)

• Purposive sampling – first generation into university, second year

in the university, STEM and Humanities disciplines

• Questionnaire to determine suitability

So Southe uthern rn Afric frican an Rur urality ality in in Highe igher r Ed Education

Welcoming Event (rules of engagement, rurality is) Learning in rural areas P1 (iPads), form SARiHE research community Learning in rural areas p2 (critical incident) (collection

• f artifacts)

Transition to higher education Learning at university Learning and Values Sharing documentaries

Southern African Rurality in Higher Education

DEALING WITH CHALLENGES EXPEREINCED

• Different institutional contexts (constraint and enabling)
• Expertise of co-investigators
• Gaining entry and differing expectations
• Use of iPads during the initial data gathering
• Developing rapport and handling ethics
• Dedicating time

Southern African Rurality in Higher Education

LESSONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH IN SIMILAR CONTEXTS

• Rural students are not homogenous, neither are

university contexts - need to adapt

• Use of a uniform data gathering guide offset some

contextual challenges – but brings up others

• Multimodal research is ideal to offset language

challenges

• Longitudinal data collection is ideal in enabling rapport

and trust

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The SARiHE project: Key Findings

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Strengths and opportunities from rural life

• Responsibility for areas of work within the family

and community.

• Living in resource-constrained environments helps

to manage resource constraints in university life.

• Strong support from some members of the

community such as family members, principals, teachers and siblings.

• Tasks and practices typical of rural life, such as

cattle herding, may provide opportunities to acquire skills that can be carried over into schooling or university.

• More communal and group-oriented approaches

encourage academic success at school and at university (but sometimes conflict with university ethos - a challenge as well as a strength).

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• Perception by rural students that they need to ‘adapt’, ‘adjust’ or ‘fit it’, and for

many, the transition from rural areas to HE is challenging:

• ‘...it is challenging for me personally because I felt like I was not accommodated as

you know, a child from the rural areas, but at the same time university is university, life must go on, you must just try to find a way to fit in.’ (discussion group, R.U., 25 March 2017, F.)

• ‘You have to change and the curriculum just stays the same.’ (discussion group, R.U.,

2 May 2017, F).

• Other co-researchers actively resist adaptation: ‘Adapting to the changes means

changing my lifestyle - that is close to impossible. There is a Xhosa saying that goes "ungamkhupha umntu ezilalini kodwa awunakuzikhupha iilali emntwini". This means that even though I'm no longer in the rurals, the values I got there can never be

• erased. The education system here purposely or otherwise favours those who grew up

in such privileged lifestyles and that is of great disadvantage to rural students…’ (Google Docs, R.U., April 2018, F.)

Negotiating the transition to university

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Becoming a university student

• Outreach to support access into rural schools and

communities was patchy

• Widespread reports of lack of access to technology

and wifi infrastructure in rural areas

• Feeling initially powerless – loss of agency
• Poverty, crime and personal safety, inability to pay

fees, residence facilities, lack of food

• Language/lack of familiarity with English as medium of communication at university
• Significant challenges with technology at university – deficit led support models
• Lack of knowledge/experience in pedagogic practices, e.g. scientific experiments,

equipment.

• Perception that non-rural students are more advanced -often afraid to ask for help for

fear of seeming ‘stupid’

• Perception of differential treatment of black and white students by white lecturers

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‘…you know what the Dean said to some people at the beginning of the year when you wanna take CompSci? “You people will like not try to take CompSci … you don’t even know how to switch on the computer” … You get there, they say “design your own game”…’ (discussion group, R.U., 1 April 2017).

Transitions into new worlds

‘I had no phone and I didn’t even know internet and google, even a computer. I saw one when I went to apply [to university] ... when you get to the internet café, you ask strangers to assist you.’ (discussion group, R.U., 22 July 2017, F). ‘I’m studying Micro Biology and Biochemistry and.. You come to university and like our practicals most of the time we use things like microscopes and you have never seen a microscope in your life and never used one before, and everyone is so busy like you don’t know what to do, you don’t know what to touch….. ‘ (discussion group, R.U., 25 March 2017).

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• Some rural students initially socialised with people

from similar backgrounds who spoke the same languages, and then they integrated with students from different backgrounds and races.

• They joined a range of societies and groups to ease

the transition from rural areas to H.E. institutions.

• Digital technologies enable informal learning

practices:

• ‘Learning at university is not as easy as it was back in

high school. You cannot do everything on your own and need the help of your peers every now and then … my Human Physiology laboratory group created [a WhatsApp group] so that we can help each other with our work...’ (Evernote, U.J., 24 August 2017, F.)

Social and technological resources drawn upon

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• Importance of recognising learning as occurring across various

lived spaces – this research points to the importance of rural experiences

• How are rural students misrecognised?
• How can we, in HE open up spaces for the recovery of agency of

rural students and what might those spaces look like?

• The experiences of rural students can begin to make a

contribution to epistemic becoming – but only if their ‘largely ignored struggles’ are listened to

• …and the knowledges and practices that they bring to university

from their rural areas are acknowledged, celebrated and integrated into curricula/structures

Positioning , identities and agency

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So Southe uthern rn Afric frican an Rur urality ality in in Highe igher r Educ ducatio tion n

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