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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal – Vol. 9, No. 9

Publication Date: September 25, 2022

DOI:10.14738/assrj.99.13112. Sinkala, H., Simui, F., & Muleya, G. (2022). A Plethora of Roles Played by Teacher Unions in Fostering Improved Learning

Environment in Schools in Zambia. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 9(9). 450-464.

Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom

A Plethora of Roles Played by Teacher Unions in Fostering

Improved Learning Environment in Schools in Zambia

Henry Sinkala

Institute of Distance Education, University of Zambia

Lusaka, Zambia

Francis Simui

Institute of Distance Education, University of Zambia

Lusaka, Zambia

Gistered Muleya

Institute of Distance Education, University of Zambia

Lusaka, Zambia

ABSTRACT

The study explores a myriad of roles played by Teacher Unions in fostering

improved learning environment in selected schools of Lusaka, district, Zambia. A

case study design was employed on a target population that comprised 28

participants from primary and secondary schools and teacher unions. Expert

Purposive sampling technique was applied to sample participants from teacher

union officials in Lusaka District. Data generated through interviews; Focus Group

Discussion; and Document Review were thematically analyzed. Emergent from this

study is a plethora of roles played by teachers’ unions such as participation in

education policy making process, defending teacher members, presiding over

disputes between member and the employer and improving peaceful learning

environment in schools among others. In addition, Unions were actively engaged in

fighting for professional recognition for teachers as well as fairness in promotion.

Unions were involved in advocacy in relation to education reforms and teachers’

professional output as well as learner achievement in examinations. Thus, it is

recommended among others that, Teacher Unions should enhance their knowledge

and skills set to effectively deliver on various divergent mandate areas on behalf of

their membership.

Keywords: Teacher Unions; Roles; Education; Learning Environment; Schools; Lusaka;

Zambia.

INTRODUCTION

In Zambia just like elsewhere, teacher unions play a major role in education policy making. This

has been primarily through their effect on the professionalization of the teaching force and their

policy advocacy. Through publications, courses, and leadership opportunities, unions likely

have positively contributed to instruction and teachers’ sense of purpose. Through policy

advocacy, unions have informed governments of crucial local knowledge, have contributed

towards research, and established mechanisms of collaboration [1]. However, the there is a

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Sinkala, H., Simui, F., & Muleya, G. (2022). A Plethora of Roles Played by Teacher Unions in Fostering Improved Learning Environment in Schools in

Zambia. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 9(9). 450-464.

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.99.13112

need for more research on the role of public sector teachers’ unions towards learning in public

schools. As such, much has appeared in the literature about this polarizing topic. The public

domain is the sector where most teachers work, where teachers’ unions are strongest, and

where learners are most disadvantaged.

On one hand, policymakers have criticized teachers’ unions as hindrances to quality-enhancing

change due to union policy preferences and strike activity. On the other hand, teachers’ unions

argue that they have played an important positive role in education. Specialists have fallen on

both sides [2]. In the public debate on education, these two points of view have been

exaggerated and politicized. In academic terms, the conclusion that unions play just one role is

highly suspect [3]. In this study the researcher endeavors to explore the contribution teachers’

unions have played in education particularly in Zambia with reference to learning environment

in schools. This study refrains from making causal arguments and instead aim to show that

there have been instances where unions have positively affected the quality of education

through two mechanisms: by contributing to professionalization (the development of teacher

skills) [4]; and by advocating for educational improvements [5].

In spite of Union’s presence in the political arena, many recent reforms intended to improve the

quality of teaching in public schools with extension to some private schools have targeted the

influence of teachers’ unions at both state and local level of decision making [6]; [7]. [8] asserts

that in principle, adopting standards that help teachers focus on lessons they want students to

learn, aligning their teaching to the lessons, and devising measurements that demonstrate that

students are responding to these lessons can improve learning environment as long as the

public, policymakers, and school administrators acknowledge the complexity of the learning

process and the broad outcomes that society desires. To this effect, how teachers’ unions affect

the educational production function is an empirical question and an open one.

[5] argue that collaborative working relationships between teacher unions and governments

occur in a number of jurisdictions around the world. In some places, supported by cultures of

cooperation or by legal requirements, these relationships may be relatively stable. In other

places they are more volatile, subject to change with the change of political or economic climate.

In the current policy context, the combination of top-down reforms and economic adversity has

resulted in many teacher unions reporting changes in relations or “mixed” relationships with

government neither entirely supportive nor entirely positive [9].

Teacher unions must ensure that they keep their organizational ears to the ground with respect

to teachers’ issues and concerns. What teachers want from their unions, and what unions are

uniquely able to ensure, is consistent with what [10] identified as crucial to building teacher

capacity, or what they call teacher leadership: opportunities for teachers’ professional

development and learning, establishing teachers’ right to participate in decision making,

articulating and promoting a positive professional identity, and quality conditions for teaching

and learning. Teacher unions have the demonstrated ability to engender these factors within

their own organizations, whether or not the government of the day is interested in

collaboration. Teacher unions should recognize the power of discourse to influence policy

directions.

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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal (ASSRJ) Vol. 9, Issue 9, September-2022

Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom

[11]uses hand-collected data on teachers’ union election certifications in Iowa, Indiana, and

Minnesota combined with COG data. In contrast to [12], he finds no effect on teacher pay and a

negligible effect on student teacher ratios. Similarly, [13] conducted a study on “Educational

policies, reforms and the role of teachers unions in Mauritius”. The study found that, although

Mauritius has achieved commendable success in providing universal access to basic education

through very high enrolment rates and gender equality in education at primary and secondary

level through its well-established education system, many sources of educational inequalities

exist regarding educational inputs, processes and outcomes, and when meeting basic learning

needs and assuring minimum level of competencies for all. [14] conducted a study on “How Do

Teachers’ Unions Influence Education Policy? What We Know and What We Need to Learn” also

cited that focusing on unions’ role in shaping education policy, we argue that collective

bargaining and political organizing comprise the two central but distinct forms of influence at

the district, state and national levels of decision-making, the study notes recent changes in state

policy directly and indirectly affecting unions and union priorities.

[15] in their study on the impact of teachers’ unions on educational outcomes: What we know

and what we need to learn, considered more than three decades of research on teachers’ unions

in the United States. Focusing on unions’ role as potential rent-seekers in the K-12 educational

landscape, and specifically how teachers’ unions impact district and student outcomes, the

study found that the preponderance of empirical evidence suggests that teacher unionization

and union strength are associated with increases in district expenditures and teacher salaries

particularly for experienced teachers; the evidence for union-related differences in outcomes

is mixed, bur suggestive of insignificant or modestly negative union effects. The study concludes

that most notably in the political arena and by noting that recent changes in state laws

pertaining to teachers and teacher unions may provide context for new directions in

scholarship.

[16] conducted a study entitled a qualitative study of the perceptions of public-school teachers

and administrators on the teachers’ association and the collective bargaining process in an Iowa

urban school setting to explore urban Iowa public school administrators’ and teachers’ current

perceptions of the relationship between teacher associations and collective bargaining. The

study concludes that various implications occur for educators at all levels. In a similar more

current literature, Hall, [17] in their study on collective Bargaining and school District Test

Scores: Evidence from Ohion Bargaining Agreements, focuses on the relationship between

collective bargaining agreements and student test scores in Ohio public school districts. The

researchers analyzed teacher contract provisions during the 2007-08 academic year,

measuring the strength of each teacher union by the number of pages included in its bargaining

agreement. The researchers also looked at the percentage of ninth graders in each district who

passed the state’s math proficiency exam in 2008. The study revealed that in Ohio school

districts, the length of a union’s collective bargaining agreement was linked to lower math

scores. It would seem that more stringent negotiations lead to less productive education

production.

Similarly, [18] conducted a study on the role of the Namibia teachers’ union in the development

of the staffing norms policy in Namibia whose focus was on the role of stakeholders’ in the

policy process played by the Namibia National Teachers’ Union in the formulation of the staffing

norms policy in Namibia. The findings stressed the significance of stakeholder involvement in