1. Who’s that in the staffroom?
Neil Avery
University of KwaZulu-Natal

2. The context ‘That ****** just tried to drive his car over me!’
‘If I see you again, I’ll cut your throat!’
‘They’re unprofessional – they come late and still hit pupils.’
‘They are racists and won’t change.’
‘We can’t talk to them – they don’t listen.’
‘They better watch out – we are here now.’

3. Preparing to ‘manage ‘diversity?
HEI’s and the Department of Education
Rationalism as an enabling framework
Overlaid with communitarianism
Teamwork, collegiality and harmony
Rooted in monocultural traditions
Where equality already exists
Links to Cognitive learning theory
So is it appropriate in the context of SA?

4. A more critical, integrated approach
Social Learning theory
Communities of Practice (Wenger,1998)
Distributed leadership
Teacher leadership (Grant, 2010)
A Capabilities approach (Sen, 1999 and Nussbaum, 2000)
Transformative discourses (Blackmore, 2006)

5. Diversity
Differences in race, language, culture, religion, gender, sexuality, age.
Changes in some learner populations.
Changes in teachers’ distribution.
Integration?
Shared practice, new knowledge, identity
Assimilation?
Induction into established practice and power

6. Danger of ignoring diversity
Growing ‘minority’ groups
Strengthening voices and identities
Exercise of new power
‘Threat’ to the existing norms
Potential for conflict
‘Othering’ – them and us

7. What about Policy? The Constitution (1996)
The South African Schools Act (1996)
The Task team Report (1996)
The National Education Policy Act (1996)
Norms and Standards for Educators
Circulars
Local policies

8. An integrated alternative
Communities of Practice
Individuals learn through everyday interaction with others
Shared practice and new learning
Identity formation – in the collective
Legitimate participation

9. An integrated alternative
Distributed leadership – a hybrid of ‘communitarianism’?
Teacher leadership
Contest the privileged power of formal position
Create space for participation
A conscious move towards a more critical and reflexive view of power

10. An integrated alternative
A Capabilities approach
Based on human dignity and explicit freedoms
Creates supportive and enabling spaces
Fosters legitimate expression
Three types of capabilities
Basic – inherent but undeveloped
Internal – a readiness to act
Combined – legitimate structures and opportunities to act

11. An integrated alternativeNO
Transformative discourse
Not management of diversity
By those who have power (assimilation)
Not management for diversity
Multicultural harmony and consensus
Diversify management and leadership
Reflexive
Deliberate practices to enable agency
Negotiation of capabilities
Consideration of who leads and manages NO
YES

12. Conclusion We have to shift our thinking about diversity
It requires ‘deliberate practices that enable agency’ (Blackmore, 2006)
We must negotiate capabilities
We can’t just talk democracy, we must practice it