Overcoming the achievement GAP: the perception of students in two historically disadvantaged South African school

Abstract

This paper reports on two historically disadvantaged South African schools who managed to overcome the perennial problem of the achievement gap (as measured by matric results) between the historically advantaged and the historically disadvantaged schools. A qualitative, narrative research design, entailing interviews for exploring and studying the view of the students, were used. From the data analysis the following themes emerged as sets of factors that, in the opinion of the learners, had contributed to the two schools’ bridging of the achievement gap: a supportive teaching and learning environment, teacher effectiveness, collaborative relationships, positive school climate and principals’ instructional leadership. These factors are discussed, and are compared/contrasted to and synthesised into what appears in the scholarly literature as factors explaining achievement differentials between different students and different schools. This research cautions educational leaders and scholars not to attach too much value to theories such as socio-economic and cultural reproduction in as far as they portray the socio-economic descent of learners as deterministic with respect to their achievement levels at school. Rather than such a fatalistic view, this study tends to support the more voluntaristic view that intra-school factors are significant, and can potentially overcome extra-school factors.