Time to flock: time together strengthens relationships and enhances trust to teach despite challenges

ABSTRACT

This study applies an Afrocentric theory (Relationship-Resourced Resilience [RRR]) to analyze teacher resilience in a less-researched context in the Global South. The Isithebe-intervention study in South African schools investigated how time together to strengthen relationships promotes teacher resilience despite structural disparities. Teachers were conveniently sampled, and South African schools were purposively sampled using concurrent mixed-methods triangulation. Based on Ubuntu social-connectedness principles, the intervention gave teachers monthly art-based time to communicate and build relationships. Pre- and post-intervention measurements included teacher-reported surveys (ENTREE and REPSSI SC subscales) and participatory reflection and action conversations (verbatim transcriptions and visual data). Inferential statistics were used to analyze quantitative data and showed that time together increases resilience, social connectedness, and trust. Qualitative results show time spent together promoted a sense of belonging, safety, and trust in supporting one another by sharing ideas for informal professional development or caring for children, families, and friends who depend on such help to withstand ongoing challenges. Few teacher resilience studies exist in Global South and South Africa. Structured time to build relationships capitalizes on dominant but marginalized Afrocentric belief systems favoring interdependent, collective resilience values, beliefs, and practices and encourages instructors to teach countering deficit notions of structurally disparate contexts.

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher resilience
• trust
• South African primary schools
• collaboration
• Afrocentric values
• beliefs and practices
• Relationship-Resourced Resilience (RRR)
• teacher professional development

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

Due to the nature of this research, the data cannot be shared publicly so supporting data is not available.

Data deposition

Not applicable as the data has will not be made available to the public.

Additional information

Funding

The study was made possible thanks to funding from the Samuel Family Foundation and support from Kim Samuel and Synergos Institute.

Notes on contributors

Jessica Versfeld

Jessica Versfeld is a counselling psychologist who specialises in student wellness at the University of Pretoria. For her doctorate degree, she investigated the utility of a school-level social connectedness intervention as a pathway to promote teacher resilience in challenged contexts. She presented her PhD study entitled ‘Social connectedness as pathway to teacher resilience in challenged settings’ at the South African Positive Psychology Association (SAPPA) 2019 congress. Her first research publication was based on her master’s thesis, and she published an article in The Journal of Child and Adolescent Mental Health entitled ‘An expressive self-esteem group intervention for adolescent girls who have been sexually abused’ 2014.

Marien Alet Graham

Marien Alet Graham Graham is a specialist in the areas of assessment and quality assurance, nonparametric statistics and statistical quality control. She is an associate professor in the Department of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education at the University of Pretoria. She has made contributions to many disciplines, including education, healthcare, social issues, and agroforestry. She is a Y1-rated researcher with the National Research Foundation (NRF), South Africa, as well as the co-author of Nonparametric Statistical Process Control, published by John Wiley & Sons (2019). She furthermore serves on the editorial advisory board of Scientific Studies and Research, Series Mathematics and Informatics, and has published in several accredited international peer-reviewed journals. She regularly presents her research at national and international conferences.

Liesel Ebersöhn

Liesel Ebersöhn (Director of the Centre for the Study of Resilience and Full Professor, Department of Educational Psychology, University of Pretoria) is a registered educational psychologist and expert on social dimensions of resilience that support positive health and wellbeing outcomes in severely challenged Southern African spaces. Through engagement in global education and poverty think tanks, panels and boards she is influential in Global South education development circles and actively supports education policy reform in the Global South based on evidence of resilience-enabling transformation in Africa. She is a recipient of numerous scientific association-, national- and institutional awards. She is the World Education Research Association President Elect.