**1.1 Background of the study**

The performance of employees is critical to the survival of organizations. Likewise, the performance of teachers is one of the key factors determining school effectiveness and efficiency in terms of ensuring students' learning outcomes [1]. It can be argued that teachers are the backbone of any education system implying that educational resources and some other school-related activities are useless in the absence of well-educated and committed teachers [2, 3]. Teachers can make or break a nation, as they are the backbone of the education system. Nothing can substitute the role of good teachers in building a nation as they are at the forefront in ensuring the quality of education.

Therefore, for quality of education to be realized in any education system, great attention should be given to teacher education i.e., teachers' recruitment, training, assignment, and engagement in on-job-training or continuous professional development. Teachers' performance is the most crucial input in the education sector [4–7]. Therefore, for teachers to accomplish their responsibilities of assisting students to acquire the necessary knowledge, skills and values, it is important to engage them in continuous professional development programs [8–10]. Hence, it is in light of the above argument that the government of Ethiopia has started offering the Higher Diploma Program or the Pedagogical Science Training for Higher Education Institutions' Teachers program since 2003 in connection to the introduction of the Teacher Education System Overhaul (TESO).

The Pedagogical Science Training for Higher Education Institutions' Teachers program has been launched believing that pedagogy is a cross-cutting issue in all disciplines to improve the quality of education. Therefore, all educational institutions should find means through which the teachers teaching there get an in-depth awareness about pedagogical science theories, principles, and practices. This, in turn, is important to apply active learning to enhance the learning outcomes of students via addressing their diverse learning styles [11].

To produce productive and happy citizens, teachers must be equipped with a keen knowledge of the subject matter(s) they teach and at the same time, they must have sound knowledge and skills of pedagogy [2]. In this venture, pedagogy has a great contribution to the holistic development or well-rounded development of a student i.e., it has a great contribution to the development of the head, hand, and heart of the learner in a balanced manner. This, in other words, means the proper application of interactive pedagogy enhances the cognitive, psychomotor, and affective development of the student.

Quality education is a basis for a well-rounded development of society [3]. In the efforts made to ensure the quality of education, pedagogy has immense contributions. Having in-depth knowledge and skills of pedagogy is very important for teachers to become reflective professionals who can identify their strengths and weaknesses and thereby improve their limitations [12]. Sound knowledge of pedagogy is also important for teachers to apply learner-centered teaching methods rather than applying the teacher-centered teaching methods [2]. In addition, having adequate knowledge of pedagogy is very important for teachers to use continuous assessment instead of using a single assessment technique in assessing their students' learning outcomes.

Similarly, getting adequate awareness of pedagogy helps teachers to conduct relevant applied research in general and action research in particular that helps to solve immediate teaching and learning-related problems. Besides, keen knowledge of pedagogy helps teachers to create positive and sustainable linkages with students' parents as well as with some other relevant stakeholders.

Pedagogy is also important for educational leaders to properly lead and/or guide the teaching and learning processes. In this regard, in-depth knowledge of pedagogy can help the leaders to understand the fact that education is a double-edged sword. This is because it is the most powerful tool to liberate and empower people [13, 14]. At the same time, unless, great care is taken, education can be used to dominate and exploit the disadvantaged group(s) in a convoluted manner.

#### *Critical Reflection on the Pedagogical Science Training for Higher Education Institution Teachers… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.101857*

Currently, the Ethiopian Ministry of Education has given great attention to pedagogical science training via the program called Higher Diploma Program. However, as can be understood from the nomenclature of the program, there is a mismatch between the contents incorporated into the training package and the nomenclature given to the program. Therefore, there is a need for adjusting the nomenclature to the contents it is meant to address. To this end, instead of calling the training package as 'Higher Diploma Program,' which is quite generic, it is better to designate it as 'Pedagogical Science Training for Higher Education Institutions Teachers' program. Moreover, to make improvements to the contents as well as the delivery of the 'Higher Diploma Program,' it is important to analyze its strengthens and weaknesses.

Realizing the above-intended improvements require research-based evidences. In other words, there is a need for conducting a study upon the degree to which the current Higher Diploma Program has brought improvements in terms of enhancing life-long learning, teachers' professional development and success in Ethiopian higher education institutions. In doing so, it is necessary to identify the strengthen and the drawbacks of the program thereby suggesting ways through which the program could be improved. Nonetheless, although I have served as the coordinator as well as the facilitator of the Higher Diploma Program at Arsi University, Ethiopia since 2016, to the best of my knowledge, there is no rigorous study that looked into the effectiveness of the program in terms of fulfilling its intended purposes. Therefore, this curiositydriven study intends to figure out the degree to which the program is effective in enhancing instructors' continuous professional development and success in offering quality education to their respective students.

#### **1.2 Statement of the problem**

In Ethiopia, formal teacher education started for the first time in 1944 with the launching of a primary school teacher education and training program in the premise of Menelik II School in Addis Ababa through the assistance of the British Council [15]. Nevertheless, a fully-fledged teachers training institute was later inaugurated at Gulale in Addis Ababa in 1946/47 [16]. This particular time marks the beginning of a period of reform in the teacher education system of the country.

In Ethiopia, secondary education is expected to be taught by teachers who have a first degree in their respective disciplines [17]. When it comes to the secondary teacher education program, from 1994 to 2002, it was a four-year program. Nevertheless, with the introduction of a new teacher education policy called Teacher Education System Overhaul (TESO), which initiated a wide-ranging reform in the Ethiopian teacher education sector in 2003 [18], the secondary teacher education program was reduced from four to three years.

In TESO, it is argued that Ethiopian teacher education institutions have to play an initiating role in the teacher education paradigm shift. The reform proposals presented by TESO offer a direct challenge to the teacher education institutions, in the sense that it is argued to be necessary to redefine Ethiopian teachers' roles as active change agents in the classrooms, within their communities, and ultimately within the Ethiopian society [18]. The competencies that Ethiopian teachers at all levels must exhibit are assumed to guide the nature, organization and management of all programs are clearly set to serve as indicators for measuring progress towards the paradigm shift. Under TESO, Ethiopian secondary teacher education was following the concurrent model where prospective teachers were pursuing their major area courses side by side with professional courses.

Nevertheless, in 2009 the Ethiopian Ministry of Education shifted from TESO to Post Graduate Diploma Teaching (hereafter PGDT). The ministry claimed that although TESO has planted very well the culture of partnerships between schools and teacher education institutions and the relevance of active learning and continuous assessment in the Ethiopian teacher education system, the notions seem to be abused due to misconception and resistance. Furthermore, the ministry asserted [19] that the core factors that hinder the successful implementation of TESO were: misunderstandings about the program by the teacher education institutions' personnel; high level of enrolment in secondary teacher education programs which forced teacher education institutions to compromise on many useful issues of TESO; and the clash of the rhetoric of active learning and TESO's practicum program with the use of plasma TV in secondary schools.

Hence, the Ethiopian Ministry of Education replaced TESO with a new secondary teacher education program entitled PGDT where prospective teachers undergo professional courses for one year after finishing their undergraduate studies in applied disciplines [19]. The changes promoted by PGDT implied that a consecutive model has been used where prospective secondary education teachers take intensive training in professional courses for one year after finishing their undergraduate studies in applied disciplines to be qualified as teachers. The teacher education curricula of this program entirely focus on professional courses instead of offering subject matter training in parallel with pedagogical science training.

When it comes to higher education institutions, one of the measures that have been taken by the Ethiopian Ministry of Education to enhance the quality of the teaching and learning process in higher education institutions of the country has been commencing the offering of the program called Higher Diploma Program since 2003. Thus, successful completion of the program has been considered as a requirement for all higher education institutions' instructors of the country. This notion includes making the program compulsory for all higher learning institutions' instructors, making constant follow up and improving the training and its actual implementation.

Apprehending the above-intended improvements require research-based evidences. Put differently, there is a need for conducting a study upon the degree to which the Higher Diploma Program has brought improvements in terms of enhancing teachers' continuous professional development and success in Ethiopian higher education institutions is a worthwhile concern. Therefore, it is in light of the above arguments that this study is intended to critically reflect on the successes, drawbacks, and prospects of the program underway in the Ethiopian higher education institutions.
