self-determination, it brought little change to education, however. An
education agreement was reached that included implementation of New
Zealand curriculum content, textbooks and national examinations. It was not
until the 1990s that locally-developed national curriculum and examinations
were introduced.
Fiji has conducted four education commissions; three of which were held
prior to independence, in 1909, 1926 and 1969. The most significant findings
of the 1969 Education Commission report were: significant gaps in the areas
of access and equity, a need for curriculum reform, a shortage of trained
teachers, and a general dissatisfaction with the teaching profession. The
report also emphasized that the system promoted passive teacher-centred
pedagogies that encouraged rote learning. Three decades later, the fourth
education commission, conducted in 2000, found that things had not
changed much since the 1969 review (Koya-Vaka’uta, 2002). Consequently, an
agreement was signed between the Fiji Government and Australia initiating
the Fiji Education Sector Reform Project (FESP), which ran from 2003 to 2008
(Koya, 2008, p. 29).
Fiji, like all Pacific island nations, adheres to a centralized curriculum
development approach. National curriculum decision-making is located
within the Ministry of Education’s Curriculum Advisory Services (CAS). This
centralized system, driven by content and examinations, fuels the ‘teacher
talk’ (teacher-centred) pedagogy and rote learning identified as serious
concerns by the 1969 and 2000 education commissions.
A 2006 study conducted at the University of the South Pacific titled ‘Teacher
Education for the Future’ found that teachers in Fiji at that time felt pressured
to deliver results. A participant in that study said that school pressures and
the ‘top-down approach to curriculum development and implementation
of curriculum development taken by the ministry of education’ prevented
them from being innovative (Tuinamuana et al., 2006). The study report
notes that: ‘These pressures sometimes forced them [teachers] into using
a ‘banking’ pedagogy (transmission model of teaching) as opposed to the
more innovative and child-centred pedagogies emphasized in their training’
(Tuinamuana et al., 2006, p. 334).
As part of the 2000 Education Commission, 70 teachers were surveyed
and asked about their perceptions of teaching (Coxon, 2000, pp. 407–18).
Coxon noted that three common teacher complaints were limited resources,
examination pressure and teacher overloads (p. 414). An added dimension to