Leveraging Teacher Social Networks to Improve Education in Tanzania

For the past eight years, RTI has been implementing USAID-funded education programs in Tanzania, helping the Government of Tanzania improve learning and educational outcomes among young students. Through the Jifunze Uelewe (Learn and Understand), Tusome Pamoja (Let’s Read Together), and Hesabu na Elimu Jumuishi (Arithmetic and Inclusive Education) projects, numerous early grade instructional strategies have been introduced for reading, writing, mathematics, inclusive education, and supporting students’ social and emotional learning.

However, the uptake of new learning pedagogies has not been consistent across districts and wards.

To understand why some teachers adopted the new pedagogies and others did not, from October 2022 to September 2023, RTI designed and conducted a pioneering study with local government counterparts in Tanzania’s Mtwara Region that applied social network analysis (SNA) to explore the composition and structure of the  relationships among primary school teachers and head teachers in Tanzania, and the potential for those networks to increase the spread of information, enthusiasm, and support for teachers’ uptake of best practices. 

                    Download the study report

How Social Network Analysis Enhances Teachers’ Adoption of Best Practices in Tanzania

This tool profiles the characteristics of interactions within networks, for example, the density of the network overall and the efficiency with which information is diffused.  The tool also characterizes the interactions of individuals in the network, including but not limited to individuals who are potential influencers in the network. 

The Power of Peer-to-Peer Learning in Influencing the Adoption of New Pedagogic Strategies

Research on educational change and the diffusion of innovation suggests that peer-to-peer learning can be a powerful way to enhance the dissemination of information and can provide the support teachers need to adopt new methodologies. It can also be more effective than top-down approaches for changing behavior. 

As teachers interact with each other, they learn and adapt their beliefs and actions toward new ideas and practices, with a variety of outcomes. Depending on the network of collegial relationships and interactions in a school or wider community, teachers may align their actions with new pedagogies or may stick with their previous ways of doing things. This is particularly relevant in Tanzania, which is a highly social culture. 

Summary of Methods: Social Network Analysis of Teacher Networks in Rural Tanzania

This study combined SNA with qualitative analysis to answer the following research questions:

1. What are the characteristics of teacher social networks in rural primary schools in Tanzania, and how might these network structures have influenced the adoption of effective new pedagogic strategies?

   A sociometric inventory was administered to generate the data needed for the SNA and structured informant interviews were conducted to support interpretation of SNA findings. Respondents were asked to identify persons with whom they had communicated with during the past month. Then, for each of their contacts, respondents answered questions about the content, context, frequency, and helpfulness of their interactions. 

   For this SNA analysis, we included any communications that included discussion about formative assessment, a new instructional practice. Through informant interviews we learned about teacher attitudes and successes in adopting formative assessment pedagogies, which allowed investigation of the relationship between SNA findings and adoption.
    

2. Who are the potential influencers in teacher social networks in rural primary schools in Tanzania, and how might these individuals have influenced the adoption of effective new pedagogic strategies?

   In order to understand who the potential influencers in these networks were we generated SNA centrality rankings for individuals in the network (e.g., degree centrality) and used descriptive data provided by the USAID Jifunze Uelewe project staff to determine the characteristics of teachers who ranked highest, were most centrally connected to others in the network. Teachers were designated as one of the following: head teacher, exemplary teacher, strong teacher, average teacher, or unknown (if the named teacher was not on the original roster for the study). 

Key Findings on Teacher-Influencers and Pedagogical Adoption in Tanzania

Research conducted in 20 schools in Mbawala, Milangominne, Nitekela, and Madimba wards of Mtwara Region suggests that teachers’ decision-making to adopt formative assessment was influenced by their interactions with peers and school directors; that is, school change was “socially constructed,” as it is in any complex adaptive social system. Hence, individuals and their interactions were key to effective adoption of this pedagogical practice.

The study found that teachers communicated with other teachers within a ward—inside and outside of their own schools—but rarely communicated with those outside the ward. Further, teacher-influencers* within a ward played a significant role in catalyzing or impeding the adoption of new instructional practices. 

Mbawala and Milangominne wards both had high percentages of head teachers and strong teachers ranking in the top five performers on degree, closeness, and betweenness centrality measures (63% and 88%, respectively). Teachers interviewed in these wards were more likely to try formative assessment strategies and spoke enthusiastically about the value of the practice in supporting learning outcomes. Therefore, we concluded that the well-connected teachers in these wards both modeled and supported other teachers’ use of new pedagogies and could be considered positive influencers.

In contrast, most of the influencers or individuals ranking in the top five performers of centrality measures in Madimba and Nitekela (83% and 71%, respectively) were characterized as average teachers or unknown teachers, and in interviews spoke negatively about or were hesitant to take up new strategies. We concluded that the influencers in these wards were not likely to provide good models of new pedagogies, tended to have lower enthusiasm for them, and had a negative influence on the uptake of new pedagogic strategies. In these wards, the networks were like echo chambers wherein teachers, including the influencers, reinforced conventional instruction, impeding uptake of the formative assessment strategy.

Other findings emanating from this research were that networks were denser, and teachers interacted more extensively across schools in a ward when ward supervisors provided opportunities for teacher exchanges across schools, such as school-to-school case studies. This finding along with findings on the role of positive influencers in promoting widespread uptake of new and effective teaching strategies suggest important avenues for further SNA research.

Teacher Social Networks Bring Opportunities for Future Research on Enhancing Pedagogical Adoption in Tanzania

To better understand how teacher social networks can be leveraged to enhance teacher uptake of new pedagogies, additional research is needed. One of the gaps is understanding the role that the middle tier of the education system—district officials and sub-district (e.g., ward) supervisors—play in motivating uptake of reforms.  In Tanzania, ward supervisors and district officials, along with the organizational culture they create, appear to play a significant role in catalyzing and impeding adoption, a relationship that could be explored by further investigating vertical hierarchies within Tanzania’s educational system. 

It may be possible for the middle tier to cultivate and engage social networks by providing training and other opportunities for teachers within and across wards to develop stronger, more diverse social networks; redirecting their focus from individual teachers and schools to the networks wherein teachers interact, learn, adapt and improve their instruction as they try out new pedagogical strategies; and leverage the connections of respected teacher-influencers to diffuse information about new strategies and nurture teachers’ enthusiasm and willingness to adopt them.

*Influencers are individuals who are well-connected with others in the network (degree centrality), have links with people who connected with each other (closeness centrality), and/or are in a position to function as a key broker between other individuals in the network (betweenness centrality).