Social Cohesion and Initial Teacher Education in South Africa

Initial teacher education (ITE) is a key focus in current policy particularly in respect to shaping student teachers' dispositions and capabilities to effect change within the systems they will work, and for the learners they will teach. Teachers' pedagogic strategies also mediate inequalities and continuities within the education system, linked to the schooling system and society they operate within. In South Africa, contextually relevant pedagogical strategies that address diversity, reconciliation, and promote social cohesion are crucial to enable initial teacher education to prepare teachers in this way (Sosibo, 2013). This paper draws on data from a case study of an ITE programme at one higher education institution (HEI) in South Africa. The data was collected through semi structured interviews with students and lecturers, focus groups, documentary analysis, and a survey of initial teacher educators, and was part of a large-scale study that focused on teachers as agents of social cohesion in South Africa (Sayed et al., 2015). Specifically, it considers how student teachers are prepared to enact social cohesion in the classroom. The paper concludes by discussing several implications of the research for ITE in South Africa.