Critical Studies in Teaching and Learning (CriSTaL)

Editorial

Carolina Guzman — 2023-06-29

Problematising the South African Higher Education inequalities exposed during the Covid-19 pandemic: Students’ perspectives

Corinne Knowles — 2023-06-27

Former Rhodes University students, co-authors of this article, were engaged in a knowledge-making project during the Covid-19 pandemic. This paper is a product of that project, where participants deliberated on the inequalities in the education sector based on their experiences in their university. These were exposed and exacerbated by the pandemic. Using a decolonial theoretical lens, they present the experiences of students to critique university decisions at the time. They argue for a reconnection with the idea of the university as a public good, as an antidote to the neoliberal tendencies that perpetuate inequality in the sector. This requires a reconnection with its own students, and to collaborate with them to find strategies to deal with crises such as the Covid-19 pandemic. Additionally, a reconnection between the university and the school sector could lead to greater synergy and an easier transition between school and university.

Towards understanding the influence of rurality on students’ access to and participation in higher education

Hellen Agumba — 2023-06-27

This study examines the experiences of students from rural backgrounds in higher education in South Africa in order to foster more equitable access and participation. Edward Soja’s notion of spatial justice provides a platform for thinking about rurality and its impact on access and success in HE. Soja’s trialectical account means understanding rurality historically, spatially, and socially, and enables exploration of spatial inequalities based on the interplay between rurality and HE. Data was collected within an interpretive, qualitative, case study design through document analysis, interviews, and focus groups. The findings reveal the inequalities that students experience in HE due to their rural backgrounds and the fact that their experiences, abilities, and knowledges are neither acknowledged nor valued in the university, often by the students themselves. This study contributes to understandings of the historical, social, and spatial foundations of inequality in HE and charts future directions for policy and practice.

Learning-centred assessment validation framework: A theoretical exploration

Oluwaseun Ijiwade — 2023-06-27

Classroom-based assessment validation has received considerable critical attention and many conceptualisations have emerged. While these conceptualisations are helpful in advancing our assessment knowledge, there is a need for a more learning-oriented teacher assessment practice validation. This paper builds on previous validation theories and approaches to redefine the validity of classroom-based assessment in terms of practical, useful, and trustworthy interpretation and uses of classroom assessment in enhancing learning and teaching. Further, the paper sets relevant inferences and prioritises teachers as sources of evidence in assessment evaluation based on pragmatic principles and Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory. This explication is valuable in exploring a learning-centred validation approach for evaluating classroom assessment. The paper suggests practical principles for evaluating learning-oriented, teacher-based assessment. Lastly, the paper concludes by articulating implication of the approach in any contemporary assessment system.

Teacher-team reflections on the quality and modes of thinking in Writing Intensive courses at the University of the Witwatersrand during the first year of the global COVID-19 pandemic

Pamela Nichols — 2023-06-27

Writing Intensive (WI) courses depend on student engagement and continuous responses to student work. The sudden move to online learning in the face of COVID-19 presented profound challenges to this model. This is unsurprising since it is widely accepted that globally the quality of learning, particularly the acquisition of deep literacy, declined significantly throughout the pandemic (OECD, 2021; Garfinkle, 2020). This paper draws on the reflections of three course teams in different disciplines and follows the method pioneered by John Bean and Barbara Walvoord in the evaluation of writing programmes (Bean, et al., 2005). It mines iterative and comparative teacher team reflections but does not seek to provide quantitative data on ‘proof of impact’. From the evidence of these three courses, it is suggested that student learning and problem solving can be enhanced through the explicit teaching of the types of reasoning required, in these cases analogic, empathetic, and inferential. The argument is located within wider international arguments on the crisis of deep literacy and the work of The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development on developing literacy skills in a digital world (OECD, 2021).

Doctor who? Developing a translation device for exploring successful doctoral being and becoming

Sherran Clarence — 2023-06-27

Doctoral training and education tends to focus on how to research and write a thesis, which can take many forms. However, a thesis is not the only valued outcome of a doctorate: the emerging Doctor is important too. Being and becoming a Doctor implies identity work and engaging affective dimensions of researcher development alongside researching and writing a thesis. These are not always explicit in doctoral education, though. Thus, we contend that their role in researcher development needs to be named, described, and understood. In this paper we use Constellations from Legitimation Code Theory to make visible two valued doctoral attributes and dispositions as exemplars. We have used published papers in the field of doctoral studies as data. Within increasingly diverse doctoral student cohorts, it is important to actively foreground the development of valued affective dispositions through doctoral education to enable more candidates to achieve success in their doctorates.

Reimaging reflexivity through a critical theoretical framework: Autoethnographic narratives on becoming a (de)colonised researcher

Danica Sims — 2023-06-27

The theory and practice of reflexivity need to be reimagined. In the increasingly globalised world of medical education research, critical perspectives and methodologies for honest, powerful, and just reflexivity are needed. Autoethnography offers a compelling methodological approach to reflexivity, for it interrogates self and interpersonal interactions within socio-cultural contexts through retrospective autobiographical storytelling. Southern theory, decoloniality, and intersectionality together framed critical reflections on power inequalities at personal, contextual, and epistemological levels, throughout the qualitative research process. Reflective questions informed by these theories are included to practically guide individuals in their reflexivity. We are collectively responsible for epistemically- and socially-just research, which means the disruption of normative and hegemonic (i.e., White, Western, Eurocentric, and colonial) research and reflexivity practices; and the development of ethical research that does not reproduce inequalities but welcomes and amplifies other ways of knowing, doing and being.

Karen Barad as Educator: Agential Realism and Education

Petro Du Preez — 2023-06-29

Murris, K. 2022. Karen Barad as Educator: Agential Realism and Education. Singapore: Springer Nature Singapore Ptd Ltd.