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J Educ Change (2008) 9:281304
DOI 10.1007/s10833-008-9070-1
Published online: 13 March 2008 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2008
Abstract In 2003 the Ethiopian education system experienced wide-ranging reform that touches every aspect of the system. This reform is called TESO (Teacher Education System Overhaul). Designed to address educational problems in Ethiopia, TESO introduced signicant structural changes and promised to bring a paradigm shift in the Ethiopian educational system by engaging teacher education in changing society and promoting democratic, practical, and problem-solving education. This paper examines, through an analysis of the TESO document and an examination of the views of teacher educators, TESOs assumptions, mission and the coherence among the various components of TESO. It also reveals gaps and discrepancies between TESOs mission, its reform process, and strategies. The promise and assumptions of TESO are challenged by considering extant realities in Ethiopian schools and evidence from literature on effective teacher education programs and educational reform. The paper reects on how, by giving priority to equity, TESO compromises on some elements of effective teacher education programs. It is indicated that TESO has been a welcome addition to the Ethiopian education system as it addresses elements that had previously been missing from the system, such as, outlining directions to teacher education, devoting longer duration for practicum, and heeding seriously to the professional preparation of teachers. At the same time, it is contended that the imbalance among program components, its permeability to ill-prepared students and the contradiction between program rhetoric and strategy and reform processes, as described by teacher educators, could be stumbling blocks which prevent TESO from fullling its promises.
Keywords Teacher education in Ethiopia Educational reform
Teacher education program
D. M. Mekonnen (&)
Faculty of Education, Bahir Dar University, P.O. Box 79, Bahir Dar, Ethiopia e-mail: [email protected]
Reections on the Teacher Education System Overhaul (TESO) program in Ethiopia: Promises, pitfalls, and propositions
Dawit M. Mekonnen
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282 J Educ Change (2008) 9:281304
Introduction
After 17 years of guerrilla ghting, the Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) took power in 1991, and it has subsequently launched far reaching reforms in many sectors. A new education and training policy was introduced in 1994, resulting in structural and conceptual changes at all levels of the education system. With the introduction...