Emerging Trajectories and Sustainability of ICTs in Educational Reforms in Africa: Exploring the Prospects of the Teacher Laptop Policy in South Africa

The integration of information communication technologies (ICTs) in education is part of the effort to ensure a better outcome in public education. Other sectors of the society have raised productivity by using technology to augment human labor. However, the teaching profession in Africa has become more labor-intensive due to lack of necessary resources. In line with the goal of raising teacher productivity, and given the shortage of qualified teachers in the system, the Teacher Laptop Initiative (TLI) policy in South Africa aims to bring innovation in the teaching profession by constantly improving the contents and pedagogical skills of teachers. Based on the technological, pedagogical and content knowledge theoretical framework, this study explores the prospects and challenges of the TLI program. As desirable as policy may be, this paper argues that a successful TLI in South African schools will go beyond providing teachers with laptop computers. The success will depend on how well the laptops are used by teachers for productive educational outcomes. The study examines the importance of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in education reforms in Africa within the context of South Africa’s Teacher Laptop policy. Other sectors of the society have raised productivity by using technology to augment human labor. Contrarily, teaching in Africa has become more labor-intensive due to lack of necessary resources. The Teacher Laptop Initiative (TLI) is part of the effort to improve teaching and the overall educational system in South Africa. Helping the 350,000 teachers in South Africa to effectively integrate modern ICTs into teaching and learning processes is a major investment and a catalyst to support education reform in the country. Given that no educational system can rise above the quality of its teachers, the continuous development of teachers is crucial in South Africa, especially in an effort to reengineer the country’s social structure after many decades of a brutal apartheid system. Besides, training and updating the content and pedagogical skills of educators in South Africa is imperative for the realization of the goals of Education for All (EFA) espoused in the country. The integration of ICT has become a policy choice in educational development and reform in Africa. This emergent trajectory reinforces the belief that conventional approaches to teaching cannot cope with the high demand for education in the country. In this study, ICTs are treated as tools, which can help to accomplish the complex task of educational improvement, rather than a subject of study for its own sake. With the case study of the TLI in South Africa, the study will explore the prospects and challenges of ICTs and teacher professional development in Africa. The goal of this study is to use Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK) conceptual framework to highlight how investment in the TLI program can bring maximum returns to education in South Africa. The TPACK theory provides a good framework which can be used to examine challenges facing ICT integration in education in South Africa. This