Abstract
Education in Tajikistan today is acknowledged by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Tajikistan and by international agencies as facing manychallenges. Infrastructure and materials need replacement or repair; curriculum needs to be adapted to changing conditions; professionaldevelopment for teachers is required, while means to retain experiencedteachers and attract new ones need to be found. At the same time, childrens'meaningful access to education has been threatened by various factors thatreduce their attendance and participation in education, keeping some youth outof school altogether. This chapter argues that research in education in Tajikistan and the development of research capacity throughout the educationalsystem is one of the prerequisites for improving the education of youth inTajikistan. The chapter outlines Soviet educational research traditions andthe systematic centralization of curriculum development and research duringSoviet times outside the republic and the resultant local underdevelopment of curriculum development andeducational research capacity on independence. Educators in Tajikistan today are influenced by inherited and new ideas on curriculum, pedagogy, teacher training, textbooks and assessment, and analyzes documents issued by the Ministry of Education and the World Bank to identify current discourses on the education system's needs. Nevertheless, there is still insufficient knowledge about the current state of education inTajikistan, and a lack of information about the attitudes of all stakeholderstowards educational change. The chapter cites recent field work on the lives and work of teachers in the field as an example of how practitioners'experience is both in accord and discord with views of both the Ministry of Education and external educational development agencies, and suggests thateffective long-term development of education in Tajikistan needs moregrounding in qualitative and quantitative research, and a greaterdevelopment of local research capacity at all levels of the educational system.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Education Reform in Societies in Transition |
| Subtitle of host publication | International Perspectives |
| Publisher | Brill |
| Pages | 211-231 |
| Number of pages | 21 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 9789087901028 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9789077874721 |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Jan 2006 |
| Externally published | Yes |