Rural Students’ Beliefs and Perspectives on the Role of Education in Society and Beliefs on Teaching and Learning

• In Event: Sharing power and vision: Student, family, and teacher voices in educational research

Proposal

In empirical and mixed-methods research in 16 government secondary schools in 8 of Zanzibar’s 11 districts, students, families, and educators shared their views on the role of school in society, their viewpoints on teaching pedagogies, and their visions of family, school, and community engagement. The schools were located in predominantly rural communities and serve students who are the first in their families to finish secondary school. This research was led by a Zanzibari civil society organization leading in collaboration with youth and adult researchers using a community-driven and participatory methodology—the Conversation Starter tools–where surveys of beliefs and experiences in education are captured from students, their families, and educators. Survey data are then given back to the school communities in easy-to-understand visualizations and students, families, and educators then have intentional and intergenerational conversations to unpack beliefs on and visions for education. These conversations serve as a springboard for developing contextually-based strategies and solutions that support greater family, school, and community partnerships in their secondary schools.

Student dialogues were held in Zanzibar with over 197 students in all 16 government schools in the study, reflecting on a survey of over 1,138 students’ beliefs on education compared to 2,000 educators and families' beliefs. To ensure that youth’s perspectives were not pushed aside, and that youth were not tokenized in the process, intentional work was done to plan, design, and implement dialogues in two steps—first youth-only conversations were held where youth had a safe space to reflect on and unpack their beliefs and ideas. Second, youth participated in intergenerational conversations where trusted facilitators worked carefully to ensure that educators and families listened to youth perspectives. From these conversations came contextually-based strategies that each school, and the civil society organization, could implement to ensure that students, families, and educators were working together to support student learning, development and well-being. These strategies are currently being tried and implemented in schools and this presentation will share not only the beliefs and solutions captured quantitatively and qualitatively through the empirical research, but also progress on implementing evidence-informed solutions in different contexts. As this research demonstrates, youth voice helps not only make the research process more inclusive and meaningful, but promotes more innovative and responsive strategies that get to the heart of critical challenges to communities. When young people have agency in leading intergenerational conversations and research, solutions are more creative and poignant—but they also push adult educators and education leaders to follow through on the promises they make and to examine their own beliefs and perspectives.

Authors

• Khadija A Shariff, Milele Zanzibar Foundation

• Emily Markovich Morris, The Brookings Institution