of education
Mail & Guardian reporter
More popular and less pie-in-the-sky. Thats what The Teachers new editor Philippa Garson has set out to do with the publication she took over last month.
Readers may not notice the subtle redesign, but the new columns and features tailor- made for teachers cannot go unnoticed. A Day in the Life will take readers into the school yards and introduce teachers around the country to their colleagues varied working realities.
In the inaugural column, teacher trainer Zed Tshabalala writes … the teacher shows me the desk where a student used to sit. The student was stabbed to death about a week ago.
She then shows me another desk that belongs to another student who was shot on the previous weekend. This one did not die but he had to be admitted to hospital.
Garson wants the publication more real and also more easy and light. So theres Chalkdust, a cartoon penned by Rapid Phase, the makers of Madam and Eve, and a column called My Favourite Teacher in which prominent personalities will reminisce about what made a teacher favourite.
Features like this will make the newspaper more interactive; so will the competitions and prizes which are planned for the new year as well as a marketing strategy to provide every school in the country with three free copies.
Theres food for the more cerebral too in the form of more investigations and news coverage as well as a monthly four-page resource kit which will be written by curriculum experts.