Defining Quality Instruction in Glocal Policyscapes: Centers of Quality Education in Namibian Life Science

Curriculum and instructional policy in Namibian education are still heavily influenced by their history of colonization and the current dominance of international emphasis on sustainable development at the global scale of education policy. This has had major implications for the ways in which teachers understand their role in the classroom. Assessment and examination policies are closely linked to external definitions of quality content, and quality teaching and learning are broadly defined based on teachers’ delivery of external syllabi and learners’ performance on external examinations. In this study, I conducted a comparative case study of the glocal Namibian policyscape of Junior Secondary Life Science since Independence through a critical policy analytic lens. My dissertation concludes that a theoretical policy center around communities’ needs would support the inclusion of their feedback into policy frameworks. This feedback loop would serve to counterbalance the heavy influence of assessment policies that are supported by sustainable development initiatives. The Namibian education policyscape presents a hopeful set of policies upon which to lean to effectively integrate local communities into the national education agenda.