Preparing Teachers in Fragile Contexts
What do we know about teacher professional development (TPD) in fragile contexts? Not much, actually. The field of TPD in fragile contexts is so devoid of accessible research that one might plausibly argue that it is not really a field at all. Mary Burns addresses some of the issues framing TPD in fragile contexts
January 27, 2015 by Mary Burns, Escola Superior de Educação de Paula Frassinetti
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12 minutes read
Mali: Teacher Interacts with Students in the Classroom (c) GPE/Michelle Mesen

The Archimedes Palimpsest (c) Wikimedia CommonsWhat do we know about teacher professional development (TPD) in fragile contexts? Not much, actually. The field of TPD in fragile contexts is so devoid of accessible research that one might plausibly argue that it is not really a field at all.

Where It’s Needed Most: Quality Professional Development for All Teachers—published by the Inter-agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE), edited by James Lawrie (Save the Children UK) and yours truly, and co-authored by 18 researchers and practitioners in the field of teacher professional development (1)—aims to address this omission. The document assembles available research on TPD in fragile environments and combines it with key themes or issues that emerged from INEE’s 2013 four-month-Teacher Professional Development in Crisis discussion forum, which tackled the issue of improving professional development for teachers in fragile contexts.

Over the next several months, I will use this space to serialize a number of the key recommendations from this INEE guide. For now, I address some of the larger issues framing TPD in fragile contexts in general (2).

Issue 1: Teacher professional development in fragile contexts is largely unexplored, under-researched and under-theorized

Professional development in fragile contexts has been largely overlooked. Thus, the vast majority of what we know about effective teacher professional development comes from “non-fragile”—versus fragile or least-developed—contexts. This is a problem.

We have no real understanding of the kinds of instruction and support teachers need or want in fragile contexts. We have no real models of what works and how they work in fragile contexts.

We have no frameworks or standards for TPD in fragile contexts—although that is starting to change. And because of this lack of a conceptual base, we have a rather emaciated notion of what constitutes TPD. Consequently, in the places that need it most, TPD often applied in an ad hoc and disjointed way, often without attention to best practice. To improve TPD in fragile environments we must begin to rigorously evaluate interventions, tap into organizational “grey literature” to identify what (really) works, consolidate and make available this information, publicize the failures and shortcomings of our own TPD offering, and, most importantly, apply this knowledge to the design and delivery of teacher pre- and in-service instructional programs.

Issue 2: “Fragility,” while broadly defined, is often narrowly interpreted

The definition of “fragility,” while broad, is often narrowly interpreted—as either peri-conflict (conflict in near future, present, and/or immediate past tenses) or in reference to the absolute least-developed environments.  Within such narrow interpretations, we have no trouble seeing places like Syria, Iraq, Niger or Liberia as fragile contexts. But we do have trouble viewing areas that don’t easily fit our narrow interpretation—US inner-city schools or migrant communities on the US-Mexico border or drug-and gang-riddled places in Latin America—as fragile.

Furthermore, “fragility” is often organization-specific, so USAID has its variation; the Uppsala Index has another, and so forth. [For the record, the INEE guide uses the OECD definition of fragility: Fragile states are those that fail to provide basic services to poor people because they are unwilling or unable to do so.]

We need to interpret “fragility” more broadly for two main reasons. First, fragility is so highly varied that the construct becomes meaningless—implying that fragile places are homogeneous—when clearly they are not.

Second, as mentioned above, we lack research on effective TPD in fragile contexts—and by so narrowly interpreting what constitutes “fragility,”  we foreclose access to research, models and interventions that work in places like Belfast, Honduras, or inner-city New Orleans, and that may have potential transference and spillover effects to so-called “traditionally” fragile locations.

Issue 3: There is little planning or preparation for or coherence around education in fragile states

Conflict may suddenly explode, but far more often it festers like a sore and runs (to clumsily paraphrase Langston Hughes). Despite the inevitability, probability, or possibility of conflict, disaster or disruption in so many places, there is often little planning around (and for) education in emergency situations.

For example, there may be no plan to secure qualified teachers or make provisions for emergency training of volunteer teachers as part of disaster or emergency preparedness. There may be no mechanisms to allow trained refugee teachers to teach in a host-country refugee camp.  Similarly, there may be little coordination among international entities—between relief, humanitarian and emergency organizations—in terms of planning, preparedness or response or coordination among sectors (health, housing, education) when disaster strikes. This need for different actors to work together is paramount.

Issue 4: Teachers in poor and fragile contexts need the same high-quality professional development as teachers in non-fragile contexts

While there is little research on effective TPD in fragile contexts, what research doesexist suggests that teachers in fragile contexts benefit from the same type of high-quality professional development as teachers in non-fragile ones—in particular, to regular collaboration with peers and with ongoing support.

Figure 2: Layers of needed instruction and supports for teachers in fragile contexts

Within the research undertaken for this guide, this need for support emerged as a highly salient issue. And as Figure 2 shows, teachers in fragile contexts need layers of support. 

Starting from the base of the pyramid in Figure 2, we see that such teachers need basic supports (safety, shelter, food and income following a war or natural disaster). Like their students, teachers often need psychosocial supports, particularly if they have been victims of criminal, military or sexual violence, as is often the case. They need humanitarian supports—instruction in gender-sensitive education or peaceful conflict resolution or inclusive education, particularly when teaching children of different tribes, clans, or religions. Especially for emergency teachers, but for any teacher, they need professional development in basic instructional strategies. They may need instruction in basic content and/or in instruction in the national language (or teaching in a mother tongue). And often, teachers in fragile contexts need all of these, together, consistently and over time. Yet, paradoxically, these teachers who have the greatest and most complex professional development needs often receive the least amount of instruction and support.

Issue 5: Quality professional development for teachers in fragile contexts cannot wait

The final issue is one of urgency.  The international education community rightly talks a good deal about the fact that quality education for the world’s children poorest cannot wait. But it often overlooks the nexus between quality education for the world’s poorest children and a high-quality teacher teaching those children. Quality teachers don’t simply emerge ex nihilo. They must be carefully recruited, screened, prepared, developed, instructed, monitored, supported, supervised, cultivated, and rewarded.

If we are serious about quality education for children, then we need to focus on teachers as we do students. This means, among other things, that quality professional development for teachers in the world’s most fragile places cannot wait.

A palimpsest, not a guide

To me, this INEE document is not a guide, but a palimpsest—a living, evolving work. Like the Ancient and Medieval manuscript (see Figure 1) in which old knowledge was “scraped off” and replaced with new information—we invite readers to begin, at the INEE site, to add, delete, critique, and engage with the ideas presented in this document. Indeed, many of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable children need you to do so.

The education world too often privileges research over actual practice. But the real expertise in TPD in fragile contexts comes, not from people like me who write about the efforts of others from the comfort of cafés in Cuenca, Boston, and Panamá City, nor from the international development chieftains and power brokers in Washington, London and Brussels.

Rather, the real expertise on teacher professional development in fragile contexts rests with the men and women who every day, often at considerable personal risk, toil in anonymity to improve the quality of teachers and teaching in many of the world’s poorest, most dangerous and most complex environments.

Notes

(1) We were very ably assisted on this guide by Tim Sullivan (now teaching in Micronesia) and Beth Mayberry of EDC.

(2) This blog post is based on the author’s webinar on behalf of the Teacher Motivation Working Group (TWMG) on August 14, 2014. The full webinar is accessible here

The TWMG includes individuals from Save the Children, International Rescue Committee, EDC, Creative Associates, Teachers College and UNESCO who aim to advance understanding about how teacher motivation impacts a teacher’s ability to provide quality instruction. TWMG is a partner with the International Task Force on Teachers for EFA. For more information, see their web page and Facebook page.

Mary Burns is a senior technology specialist and a professional development specialist at Education Development Center (EDC).

Two of the Global Partnership’s strategic objectives are to improve teacher effectiveness and to support education in fragile and country-affected countries.

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Comments

Dear Mary,

Your blogs on teacher professional development (TPD) in fragile and under-resourced communities, I believe, define the vision that will ultimately enable us to get TPD right. Pedagogies of patience and perseverance (love the alliterative lilt) that you wrote about in Nov. 2014, are vital shifts needed everywhere, but particularly in areas where public education is the only healthy way out of lives circumscribed by poverty.

The small pilot study I am now doing in Maasailand, Kenya, is a promising entry level to teacher-centered professional development in the teaching of early grade reading and writing in an area of extreme scarcity. My approach and materials, which promote higher-level thinking and self-direction, engage teachers in practices grounded in the proverb ...If a person is hungry, teach her/him to fish... This touch stone goes a long way toward clarifying and motivating a shift away from traditional rote learning.

The 6-week TPD period provided: demonstration lessons embedded in the context of a 6-part model of instruction; supported group practice; guided classroom implementation; individual cognitive coaching sessions dedicated to reflection & lesson planning; and teacher-initiated collaborative work. Teachers working in the Maasai community were taught to function as literacy coaches as well. Their job is to sustain our model of instruction, student-teacher transactions, and coaching support for a minimum of 3 terms.

Given the early success indicators of this project, I would be extremely grateful to have the opportunity to discuss my program with you and garner your thoughts regarding options for going forward.

Thank you!

Wow! I didn't realize what I was interested in had an actual name. I have a loosely put together plan to travel to developing and war-torn countries to get to know more about the culture and the communities. Through building connections with students and teachers, I hope to build an understanding about their motivation and engagement in a struggling educational system. To start with, I want to bring back what I learn to my students to help give them a global perspective on education. However, this article has really helped give focus to my greater goals of empowering our young people and teachers throughout the world.

I would like to have a conversation with someone from INEE or Unesco about retraining teachers and writing new curriculum for Cambodia. University of Missouri is already on board to remediate these teachers on MU's campus. I'm looking for scholarship money to bring these students here to learn appropriate instructional methods. This country if fragile and still trying to recover from Pol Pot's regime. This effort by division 1 university and Cambodian officials could change the course of this nation. If you can't help in this effort please point me in the way to go. I'm very passionate about getting this ball rolling.

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