Navigating barriers to academic professional development in Zimbabwe: a qualitative analysis of academics’ experiences

Abstract

In Zimbabwe, universities have established Teaching and Learning Centres to address issues of teaching quality which have become a source of concern. However, programmes designed and developed in these centres have experienced limited uptake from members of faculty thereby threatening the quality of teaching and learning. This study aims to explore the reasons for this low uptake of academic professional developed programmes from the lived experiences of lecturers. The study was framed by two theories, namely constructivism and adult learning theory. In terms of methodology, the qualitative case research approaches were used to collect data through open-ended semi-structured interviews. The population of the study was lecturers in institutions of higher learning from which 20 lecturers were purposely sampled from two conveniently sampled case study institutions. For data analysis, identification of themes was done through transcription and thematical analysis of data. The study revealed that departmental workloads, time, and pressure to do research made lecturers not to prioritize training in academic professional development. It also came out that lecturers were not consulted in the development of training programmes and that workshops clashed with scheduled academic commitments of lecturers. It was recommended that needs analysis of lecturers should be conducted to inform the workshop programmes as well as having policies that are clear on workload balance and time for support staff development.