Stage 5: Terminating interview session: This stage was an indication that the interview had come to an end, this is where the researcher made an indication by using phrases such as “in
5.2. SUMMARY OF FINDINGS
5.2.3. Coping strategies that can be nurtured to support post-school youth resilience towards academic success and a positive lifestyle
The second objective was to investigate the coping strategies that contribute to post-school youth maintaining a positive lifestyle impacting on positive career aspiration. In order to determine the presence of resilience, there needs to be adversity and vulnerability that kick starts the process where there is demonstration of certain coping mechanisms and strategies by the person going
145 through adversity. Greene, Galambos and Lee (2008:76) presented the resilience theory as the study of what and how circumstances contribute to successful consequences in the face of adversity. It is in the resilience theory and the resilience matrix that they say there should be evidence of protective factors and environmental help to nurture resilience. The protective factors in the person’s environment act as buffers to the negative effects of the adverse experiences (Aberdeen Getting it Right, 2012: 52). Protective factors of resilience presented in the study included positive mind set for academic success. There was a positive self- identity and ability to see self beyond the immediate environmental context that presented with risk and adversity. The presence of negative transformational experiences that tested the presence and limits of academic resilience became apparent together with resilience in the midst of adversity.
Some of the examples for protective buffers that were highlighted within the protective factors included the family, friends, peers, strong culture, role models, and religious beliefs. Resilience is viewed as the ability of a person to embrace the challenging life experiences and retain openness to the world in the face of risk and adversity (Dass-Brailsford, 2005: 574).
Some of the youth expressed the role and presence of positive role models as a contributor to academic achievement as some of them indicated how they aspired to be like the role models that equally shared in the hardship of the community yet they were successful because of their choice to thrive. In order to cope, it was important for many youth participants to make good friendship choices through their ability to choose the right friends. The choice of positive and optimistic friends was said to be the strength against negative peer pressures in the community. The resilient youth also had the ability to exercise a decisive approach to dealing with friends where the goal with the friends would be maintaining good academic performance. The youth demonstrated the strong values and respect for self, elders and others and this was believed to be good behaviour in order to do well in life. The participants also had empathy, compassion and concern for others and this was due to the fact that poverty affects everyone in the community.
Being there for others was an exercise of Ubuntu and this was reciprocal in that others were there for the youth, which contributed to their coping ability to do well academically. This was a coping mechanism where the youth supported each other emotionally, academically and otherwise.
146 All the youth in the study displayed a coping mechanism, which was the ability to make the effort to work hard and submit all their academic work timeously. The commitment to achieve academically enabled the youth to do well in their school performance. All the participants in the study displayed a common value of perceiving education as important, which enhanced the aspiration and willingness to pursue good career paths. All the participants had high hopes for a bright successful future. This was an important coping mechanism that kept the youth going even though the learning environment was not supportive. Many of the youth participants had a positive perception of themselves and believed in their own capabilities. There are various coping strategies that the youth displayed to protect themselves for pressure in the community and other peers. Most of these youth were found to have the ability to accept rules and operate within the reasonable rules from home and schools, which gave direction to acceptable behaviours. The youth made the effort to engage in healthy activities such as sports through the schools as well as soccer in the community though these structures were not well sponsored and resourced.
The participants also shared their choice to lead a reasonable simple life where they stayed away from harm and the pressure to accumulate money from criminal activities. The youth in the study were enrolled in various career paths in the TVET College, which demonstrated that they had the willingness to seize opportunities that bring progress and success academically leading to increased opportunities to secure jobs. In most of the participant youths, there were deliberate efforts to stay away from negative activities such as consumption of alcohol, smoking and stealing. Self-control and calling out for positive and constructive help was a coping mechanism in the resilient youth. As a means to cope, the youth further demonstrated that the unity and atmosphere in their family units acted as a strong support towards academic achievement and a resilience response. School teachers played a big role as both support and role models for the youth. The positive learning relationship with the learners provided strength and great support and acted as a protective factor to aid all the youth in the study to cope with their academic work.
Further to coping, was an expression of the presence of encouraging and supportive adults in the Tembisa community.
147 5.2.4. Significant challenges for post-school youth in the study
The first objective was to examine challenges that are considered most significant on the post- school youth within Tembisa Township. Chapter one of this study stated that there are many challenges and social ills that are faced by the youth from marginalised communities (National Youth Policy, 2015-2020:10; Guoxiu, Restrepo Henao, Theron, & Vanderplaat, 2015:7). The challenges pose threats to academic success and they act as triggers to the resilience process.
These include many youth who experience dropping-out of school, impoverishment, crime, unemployment, substance abuse, violence, teenage pregnancy, lack of resources, limited basic needs ‘shelter, food and good education’, issues with safety; and the result is youth who struggle to cope according to the National Youth Policy (2015-2020:10); Guoxiu, Restrepo Henao, Theron and Vanderplaat (2015:7). These unfavourable circumstances in the environment result in youth who experience learning difficulties (Theron, 2008: 215). Although there are social ills and challenges with poverty as a high predictor for school failure in learners, literature reveals that not all poor learners fail in school (Ramey, Ramey & Lanzi, 1998 cited in Dass-Brailsford, 2005:584)
The study found that the discussions from literature on the challenges by youth were present in the post-school youth of Tembisa, which hinder academic success. Though there were many challenges in Tembisa Township, the presence of the resilient trajectory was evident. The lack of resources, poverty and many of the mentioned odds did not prevent the youth from achieving their set career aspirations and goals which began with the willingness to achieve academically.
The interview sessions highlighted a pattern of various challenges encountered by the youth.
There were inadequate school resources as a common challenge. Many of the schools have insufficient resources towards schooling such as libraries, laboratories, books and other related equipment. The schooling experience presented the youth with barriers to effective schooling through inadequate safety environments in the school premises, crime and taverns closer to the high school premises. The presence of crime and substance abuse and easy access to alcohol presented barriers to effective schooling, which the resilience youth had to adjust to and find ways of coping. Lack of fees towards school related activities posed a challenge due to high rates of unemployment in the families of these youth. Most families in Tembisa have parents and guardians who are uneducated which posed a challenge in supporting the youth with homework
148 and other school related activities. This leads to the negative stereotype about schooling where the community puts more value to making money than in education.
Tembisa Township is classified as poor due to evidence of poverty evident in this research.
Tembisa schools, as explained in chapter two of this the study, remain under resourced (Rabane, 2016:2). The township remains disadvantaged and vulnerable which contribute to less quality education, less employment opportunities, less abundance per household due to a large number of poor families who do not benefit from the small businesses initiated by township dwellers (Rabane 2016:3). What Rakabe (2016:3) states on the presence of poverty in Tembisa was confirmed through the one-on-one interviews and focus groups. The participants indicated the challenge experienced with poverty resulting to the lack of adequate community resources towards academic and holistic development of the youth. There is a lack of funded programmes and support resources such as information and developmental centre in the township to help youth maintain success in their education. The participants further commonly shared the challenge of the presence of high unemployment rates and presence of economic segregation or marginalisation experienced by the community. This results in hopelessness amongst the youth and families in the community.
Both one-on-one and focus group interviews highlighted the presence of multiple pressures and dangers faced by the youth in the community as a strain to positive academic achievement. The pressures include community crime and pressure towards engagement in crime through forceful gangs. Many youth in Tembisa Township engaged in irresponsible unprotected sexual behaviour and activities leading to an increase to the HIV /AIDS pandemic. Peer pressure posed a great challenge for youth which was evident in high rates of teenage pregnancy in the community.
Substance abuse was also prevalent as it was said to be accessible to members of the community including school going children and the youth. Access to alcohol and poor supervision was also highlighted as a challenge for the youth translating to an expression of poor and negative upbringing.
Further to the challenges faced by the Tembisa youth, was the need to deal with safety issues.
The participants indicated experiences with community high-jacking, house break ins and
149 stealing which put pressure towards academic success. Families live in fear and feel unsafe and there is inadequate protection from both the family and community services that are supposed to bring peace and harmony to the community. Many of the participants in the study expressed that they have directly or indirectly experienced being attacked through break-ins, high-jackings and stealing that affected their well-being towards peaceful academic engagement. For the academically resilient youth that were purposefully selected for the study, it was further noted that pressure was presented by the labels that the community put on the youth. These are such as the ones presenting the youth as irresponsible and belonging to gangs. For the resilient youth, the presence of irresponsible behaviour in the community and the acceptance thereof of these behaviours as common in the youth age group, posed great challenge for the participants in the study. Peer pressure from the community caused many challenges for youth who placed great value on education.
5.3. SUMMARY OF FINDINGS FROM LITERATURE ON ACADEMIC RESILIENCE