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School inspection, the inspectorate and educational practice in Trinidad and Tobago

Norrel A. London (Faculty of Education, The University of Western Onario, London, Ontario, Canada)

Journal of Educational Administration

ISSN: 0957-8234

Publication date: 1 August 2004

Abstract

The article investigates the language and rhetoric used by school inspectors as leverage in determining the direction for professional practice among teachers in colonial Trinidad and Tobago. The approach is ethnohistorical, and the database comprises major evaluation reports of the inspectors in question in respect of one school over a 20‐year period. The research reveals that the rhetoric employed in reporting was a major vehicle in transmitting important messages about professional practice which local teachers could not afford to ignore. The practice adopted imparted distinctiveness to the schooling system at the time, and a significant observation in the process is that the rhetoric used was laced with the language of “performativity” spawned and justified within a technical rationalism constructed and put to work in the colonial period”. Technical rhetoric, the paper argues however, is not the type of medium required to do justice to education, generally recognized as a social practice enterprise.

Keywords

  • Schools
  • Education
  • Teachers
  • Language
  • Communication
  • Trinidad and Tobago

Citation

London, N. (2004), "School inspection, the inspectorate and educational practice in Trinidad and Tobago", Journal of Educational Administration, Vol. 42 No. 4, pp. 479-502. https://doi.org/10.1108/09578230410544080

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2004, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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