School Work Culture in Secondary Schools

In schools targets are set, new approaches to curricula, assessment, teaching and management are introduced, and teachers are frequently encouraged if not required to use revised curricula, altered learning resources or teaching practices. However, there remains widespread dissatisfaction with the progress. So, why is educational change so difficult to achieve? Educational reforms are either simply planted in already existing school work culture where conventional implementation mechanisms widely prevail or they are targeting only the improvement of structural variables provided that change requires altering the mindset (pedagogical assumptions, values, and beliefs) of teachers. At times, instituting a new work culture might even be necessary for a reform programme to yield optimum changes that could be counted through teachers¿ commitment in implementing a reform effort. Based on the research data collected from two groups of secondary schools in Ethiopia, this book will give insight into how the social aspect of the change process can affect the success of whole school reform programmes in a comparative analysis.