Environmental Education in Action in Secondary Teacher Training in Zimbabwe

This paper describes a story-in-action of the Secondary Teacher Training Environmental Education Programme (St2eep) in Zimbabwe. The programme seeks to integrate environmental education into the secondary teacher training curriculum. This paper critically reviews the meaning of stakeholder involvement and participatory action research which are believed by the authors to guide the programme.This is done through narrating some important processes within St2eep. These include the project formulation, college based sensitisation workshops, establishment of environmental education parameters, development of environmental education resource materials and an orientation programme for college lecturers. The paper shows that the involvement of stakeholders and participatory action research has enhanced critical reflection within St2eep. The authors also argue that participation diffuses in a multitude of ways throughout our journey of engagement with our work, lifestyle and environment

Promoting Stakeholder Participation in a Learning-Based Monitoring and Evaluation Framework

This research analysed monitoring and evaluation activities based on the Outcome Mapping methodology within the Zimbabwe Secondary Teacher Training Environmental Education Project (St2eep), an education for sustainability initiative in Zimbabwe. The majority of donorfunded environmental education programmes use conventional monitoring and evaluation approaches based on the logical frameworks (logframe) that guide the programme designs and management. Although research indicates significant problems with the implementation of these approaches, there are only a few documented examples of experiences with alternative monitoring and evaluation frameworks. The case of St2eep allowed us to compare three years of experiences with monitoring and evaluation based on the logframe, with two years of monitoring and evaluation based on Outcome Mapping. We evaluate how the project team and the donor organisation, VVOB (the Flemish Office for Development, Cooperation and Technical Assistance), have perceived the performance of Outcome Mapping with regards to the two main aims of monitoring and evaluation activities: accountability and learning. This is complemented with an analysis of monitoring documentation. The project team refers to the collaborative nature of monitoring and evaluation in St2eep, the principles of self-assessment and peer-assessment, combined with public recognition for project successes, as the key factors supporting learning and accountability through monitoring and evaluation in St2eep. The Outcome Mapping-based monitoring and evaluation system is shown to enhance ownership and participation of local stakeholders in the project’s monitoring and evaluation system

The significance of participation in capacity development and project sustainability: a case study of the Zimbabwe Secondary Teacher Training Environmental Education Project (St²eep)

This study uses a systems thinking perspective to explore the role and meaning of participation, capacity development and project sustainability in the Zimbabwe Secondary Teacher Training Environmental Education Project (St²eep). Since there was no consistent critical reflection upon the different assumptions that underpin these important aspects of St²eep in the original project design, this study aims to articulate a theoretical framework for guiding the project. St2eep is a donorfunded project, located in the Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education in Zimbabwe that seeks to integrate environmental education across the curriculum of secondary teacher education. The study first develops a theoretical framework drawing on systems thinking. In particular it uses the holistic and constructivist perspectives embedded in systems thinking to describe a number of analytic frameworks that are used as a guide to investigate participation, capacity development and project sustainability in the St²eep case study. The research methodology comprises a qualitative case study approach, which contains elements of an instrumental, evaluative and critical case study. Data-collection methods include document analysis, focus group discussions, focus group interviews, semi-structured face-to-face interviews and participant observation. Data analysis follows the constant comparative method of coding and categorising data as outlined by Strauss and Corbin (1998). The outcomes of this research show that participation processes in St²eep evolve around the interactions between a political dimension and a learning dimension. The political dimension relates to giving the project stakeholders a critical voice, allowing them to shape the project and involving them in the decision-making process. This approach has fostered an ongoing learning process in a small team of committed stakeholders based on the principles of collaborative learning, team learning and action research. Participation was shown to enhance capacity-development processes at individual and institutional level by the provision of support through learning teams, and by the renegotiation of responsibilities and power relations between lecturers involved in St²eep, donor representatives and college administrations. The strong operational role of the donor organisation was seen as a serious threat towards individual and institutional capacity development since it creates a functional but artificial and independent project system within the college system and takes over any local institutional support structure that it might seek to develop. Fostering continuous learning and capacity development, St²eep’s participatory approach was shown to contribute to a better understanding of the interconnectedness of factors that influence future sustainability of the project and the implementation of environmental education. This has assisted in the development of different scenarios on the sustainability of the project. The research shows that the project-ustainability planning process draws directly from St²eep’s ongoing learning process, with individual and institutional capacity development featuring strongly in the different scenarios, and with the external context such as the economic situation and the low priority of environmental education being recognised as important factors that need to be considered. Drawing on the findings from the case study, this study makes a tentative recommendation that donor organisations should focus more on capacity-development initiatives and avoid taking on a strong operational role in project activities. The research also recommends that there is need for a deliberate focus on both the political and learning dimensions of the participation process in order to foster local ownership. Making the learning aspect much more central in St²eep is presented as a possible strategy for motivating a larger number of college lecturers to become involved in the project and the implementation of environmental education. The study also urges St²eep to combine the different scenarios that have emerged during the project sustainability planning process and to focus on the benefits that stakeholders want to see sustained

Understanding the limitations of “quasi-mandatory” approaches to enrolment in community-based health insurance: Empirical evidence from Tanzania

© 2019 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. In recent decades, a growing number of low-income countries (LICs) have experimented with voluntary community-based health insurance (CBHI), as an instrument to extend social health protection to the rural poor and the informal sector. While modest successes have been achieved, important challenges remain with regard to the recruitment and retention of members, and the regular collection of membership fees. In this context, there is a growing consensus among policymakers that there is a need to experiment with mandatory approaches towards CBHI. In some localities in Tanzania, local actors in charge of community health funds (CHFs) are now relying on what is best described as quasi-mandatory enrolment strategies, such as increasing user fees for non-members, automatically enrolling beneficiaries of cash transfer programmes and enrolling the exempted groups (people who are entitled to free healthcare). We find that, while these quasi-mandatory enrolment strategies may temporarily increase enrolment rates, dropout and the non-payment of contributions remain important problems. These problems are at least partly related to supply side issues, notably to inadequate benefit packages. Overall, these findings indicate the limitations of any strategy to increase enrolment into CBHI, which is not coupled to clear improvements in the supply and quality of healthcare.status: publishe