New courses for Trojan horses: rethinking RPL in a South African teacher education curriculum

Abstract

This article reflects on some of the findings of a research project which investigated the practice of Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) within a major national teacher upgrading project in South Africa – the National Professional Diploma in Education (NPDE). The article analyses the ways in which a range of contextual factors have positioned RPL within the NPDE curriculum. Rather than support evaluations of RPL in the NPDE which have argued that RPL should be prior to rather than within the curriculum, the article uses and critically examines a theorized typology which characterizes RPL as ‘credit-exchange’, ‘developmental’, ‘radical’ and/or ‘Trojan horse’ to show how RPL in the NPDE has combined elements of these approaches in a distinctive way. The article suggests that the ‘Trojan horse’ model may provide the best framework for the use of RPL in linking qualifications-led professional development of practising teachers with other forms of continuing professional development. In conclusion the article reflects on how Trojan horse RPL could be included in critical engagement with the new national framework for teacher education and professional development.

Keywords:

• teacher upgrading
• RPL
• professional development
• curriculum
• work-integrated learning

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the editor and reviewers for their constructive comments on previous drafts of this article. In addition, I would like to thank my co-researchers in the research project which investigated RPL in the NPDE – Natheem Hendricks, Alan Ralphs and Nomathamsanqa Tisani. Working with them certainly deepened my understanding of the role of RPL in South African teacher education. I would also like to thank our respective universities and the Education, Training and Development Practices Sector Education and Training Authority for giving us the opportunity to do the research, and the many other educators and researchers who engaged with us during and after the period in which we conducted the research, particularly Mignonne Breier, Michelle Buchler and Tessa Welch. The views I express in the article should not necessarily be attributed to any of the persons or parties to whom I owe my thanks.