Sports Week

I haven’t been one to criticise my hosts here. I have tried to understand a different culture in a different part of the world with a very different history. I particularly try hard to see the country in the context of its colonised past; a history of abuse and exploitation, of stunted growth and development and isolation from investment, prosperity and all the social and education benefits which flow from such economic growth. To see inefficiency or lack of motivation at work as a sign of Africa’s innate inadequacy is to misunderstand what led to this state of affairs in the first place. But to ignore the lost opportunities, to turn a blind eye to the wasted time and resources or to forget the lack of care taken with anything in the public domain is to ignore what one might see as this country’s future. It’s my view that like it or not, for Tanzania to lift itself from poverty, it will need to do some of the things, belatedly, that the rest of the world takes for granted. It must educate its young people to think rather than just pass examinations; it must empower its communities so that they can take pride in the public space around them; and it must nurture a sense of urgency so that people understand that to do tomorrow what could be done today is to let someone else do it, take the credit for it and get richer than you as a result.

Mtwara Teachers College is a government funded training centre for about five hundred students, each of whom is supposed to have passed ‘A’ level to study for the Diploma in Secondary Education, qualifying them automatically for a salaried position in a secondary school. On graduation, after a month or two, each graduate is ‘posted’ to a secondary school somewhere in the country, usually according to their stated preferences. So, if you want to work in Mtwara, you will probably get to work in Mtwara; and if you don’t, you won’t.

Arriving as a European in a teachers’ training college, it takes a long time to rid yourself of those European pre-conceptions of what might motivate students and teachers to work here. Asked what are the factors which persuaded students to come to study for the diploma here, all agreed that money or a vocational drive to teach were low priorities. Access to higher education and job security were the most important factors. In the public sector, increases in salary are linked to academic qualifications and paid study leave is an entitlement after three years’ service; hence, many teachers, tutors or government workers are often away from their post. Most students here have joined this course, not because they are personally driven to be teachers, but because it is the only route to higher education available to them; to others, already primary school teachers, it is a route to a higher salary; and still to others it is a route to a job for life which they can keep whilst pursuing other private interests. Foreigners, imagining that what the place lacks is motivation or modern management, are overlooking the much deeper problems of poverty and disengagement.

Taking a step back to look at the college in a global development context, it is clear that there is a mismatch between what the country needs from its teachers and what the Ministry, through colleges such as this, is capable of achieving. Five hundred students, motivated mainly by the prospect of a certificate, rather than a job, following a curriculum that bears the marks of one designed by frustrated academics rather than classroom practitioners, taught by tutors who feel abused by their employer, underpaid and under-valued, with little experience of the classroom and with few resources and dilapidated classrooms, are unlikely to become effective nor inspirational teachers.

The extent to which this lack of motivation to excel pervades this college is seen in a number of ways: firstly, this two-year diploma course loses approximately three-quarters of its possible teaching time to other activities – meetings, holidays, late registration, or, like this week, a sports bonanza - all result in classes cancelled and students left to their own devices, but with neither access to quiet study space, books nor computers; secondly, tutors, who are timetabled to teach but three hours a week, can often leave the class, set work on the board or join classes together to deliver lectures. Of course, the syllabus is so content-rich that lectures are perhaps a more effective way of teaching.

Perhaps, most tellingly, and in stark contrast to a deep apathy in the classroom, is the college’s response - both corporate and at a personal level - to extra-curricular activities. Excitement, bonhomie and a deep sense of community and shared experience often pervades the campus for such events. This week’s sports bonanza is a simple competition between selected athletes from five colleges across this region; and yet, after fumbled attempts by the Principal to appear to be maintaining the taught timetable, within one hour of the start of the competition on Monday morning, tutors and students together had engineered a revolt and the timetable was cancelled. Over ninety percent of students and tutors moved to the athletics field just to cheer on their team. What happens every week-end in Europe – competitive matches in volleyball, basketball, netball, football and athletics – has consumed the energies of almost everyone here. An extra-ordinary briefing by one tutor to a hundred students resulted in whooping and cheering, chanting and dancing, as they proceeded to the touchline to shout and sing and beat their drums through the baking morning heat.

It is easy, sometimes appealing, to look at what happens here and what doesn’t happen and blame the lack of quality teaching on a benignly corrupt system which allows incompetent people to waste time and money; but that would be to overlook the deep-seated cultural context of authoritarianism which pervades most aspects of public life, to overlook the connection between authoritarianism and the consequent levels of disempowerment experienced by most public sector workers. The energy and commitment which has gone into preparing this sports bonanza is evidence for cynics, that if you give someone control of what they are doing, give them an opportunity to influence directly the outcome and make it relevant to their lives, their sense of personal satisfaction and the size of the contribution they are prepared to make is huge. If the teaching and learning in this college could mirror the energy and commitment shown on the sports field, the improvements could be very significant.

For Tanzania to lift itself from poverty, it will need to think hard about how and why it educates its young people. Certainly a shift away from donor dependency is needed and with it a greater belief in its own capacity to change. But, for those international commentators who continue to use targets and measures as sticks with which to beat Africa, they should look more closely at governance and empowerment. I can see all around me the evidence of local action for local people. It starts in the family, but it quickly emanates to the street or the village. Once the straitjacket of the Ministry and its missives are put away, this college acts like an African village and enjoys life.