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Ensuring that Tanzanian secondary school students receive quality science education (SE) experiences is a desire that Tanzania has looked forward to achieving.Despite clear and well-focused intent to provide quality SE experiences in schools, the progress towards achieving a target has not been so clear over decades. This review paper analyses the SE debates and the efforts made towards achieving such a goal. The analysis in this paper is built on an attempt to trace the progress and the success of the aspiration to provide quality SE in Tanzanian secondary schools. The paper also articulates how such an expectation has been achieved so far. Eventually the paper identifies some new emphases in an effort to provide quality SE and providesa relevant approach towards achieving the goal to provide excellent SE experiences in schools.

With increased attention to the importance of educational research theories and practice in recent years, a concern has arisen about the methodological and theoretical conflicts in research. Far seen is a proliferation of other types of research theories (such as positivist, constructivist, and critical theory) and other methodologies (such as mixed methods), all of which involve research disagreements. This situation not only reduces the efficiency of each methodology and theory in the development of knowledge, but also presents a challenge in selecting the most appropriate methodology for a particular research. As such, the need has therefore been to have a research paradigm that can accommodate a variety of research methodologies and use them to achieve a deeper level of understanding about a particular phenomenon. This paper proposes an intermediary perspective (that is, pragmatism) for integrating different research methodologies even when their strengths and emphases differ substantially. The increasing demand for a pragmatic perspective in educational research is based on the idea that: Pragmatism is better equipped than any other approach because of its power of complementarity whereby the weakness of one methodology is complemented by the strengths of the other methodology; pragmatism is a foundation of mixed methods; it can be easily adopted to yield better research outcomes; and it is based on the need to enrich the research data produced. Although a number of challenges to using this perspective remain, the potential insights generated by its strengths in educational research are substantial.

<p>There has been widespread concern about the provision of quality education (QE) for all learners in all contexts, but research evidence to inform this debate is quite divergent and in most of cases the question about achieving this desire seems to be full of myths. This paper examines a selection of embedded myths about QE in Tanzanian education sector. The paper specifically aims at identifying the myths, their effects in education practice, and the appropriate ways to address them. The researcher’s own experiences and voices from secondary school teachers, parents, and students were merged to inform the study. Merging of these voices helped this paper to have a major contribution towards a better understanding of myths and their adverse influence in education practice, and spotting some alternative modes of practice towards addressing them.</p>

Quality science education (SE) has emerged in the last few years as a necessary requirement for a specific country to advance technologically, develop literate scientific community, and improve the country"s competitive power. As such critical commentaries have surfaced on how SE can be best provided in schools. In the context of Tanzania the concerns towards quality SE seem to be mounted, but with little achievements as a result of a slanted definition of the term quality SE. Such biased explanation about quality SE has led to several tensions and controversies in its practice. This paper examined stakeholders" views about the meaning, measurement, and goals for providing quality SE in Tanzanian Junior secondary schools (JSS). In particular, the paper was focused on understanding what SE stakeholders consider quality SE is, how it is measured, the goals for its delivery, and the implications for all these. The study involved 100 SE stakeholders in the categories of students, teachers, and heads of schools, science alumni and parents. The paper presents useful information for SE researchers, students, and policy makers that is likely to help them appreciate some unanswered questions about quality SE and reflect on new commitments in the provision of quality SE, and guide the continued discussion and ongoing conversation about promising ways to understanding, describing and providing quality SE in schools.