In addition to leadership, the school also relied on various rituals and ceremonies for promoting common understandings on the school's goals and desired behaviour.
Below is a discussion of some of the rituals and ceremonies.
Morning assembly
One of the rituals the school relied on for the enculturation purposes was 'morning assembly'. Activities utilized by the teachers for this purpose during morning assembly included the reading on numerous occasions of the school's rules. On the occasions the teachers would also stress to the students on what the school would not tolerate and what the consequences would be for anyone ignoring the rules. One such occasion was with regard to students that had been observed smoking behind a certain classroom during break. This had the students reminded at assembly that the section behind that class was out of bounds for students and that anybody seen in that area would 'bear the consequences'. The school also used morning assembly to inculcate excellence by celebrating through the announcement of the names of both staff and students who had excelled in areas such as sport or had been elected to 'prestigious' positions such as that of belonging to the RCL. Also conveying the degree to which the school relied on morning assembly for enculturation purposes were responses such as:
Teacher: To reinforce discipline. Assembly is very important. Late coming is not tolerated, school uniform is checked You see the concept of discipline is inculcated and we are checking all that. I mean the management checks that very vigorously. I think that all adds to that we have such a good discipline situation in our school because of all these things. We don't tolerate late coming, we don't tolerate students without uniform, we have our assemblies every morning and all students are there, students are dressed, a little bit of religion is put into assembly to teach them some moral values. Plus we have lots of activities in term of culture.
Student: In assembly we are motivated about what to do and what not to do.
Especially about AIDS. It is not only people from outside like priests and teachers that only do this, you find even students doing it as well
LRC President: Yes, it (assembly) really helps with culture because every year when schools reopen the president has to make a speech about school reopening. Like today I was making a speech that everyone should go well to the holidays and take care of themselves and behave and those who did not do well there is still another chance to do better in coming days.
Prize giving ceremonies
Also providing the school with a vehicle for conveying its common understandings were prize-giving ceremonies. The ceremonies enabled the school to spread its excellence gospel by providing a platform on which the school could showcase achievements by various members, including ex-members, of the school.
Interviewees claimed that one way in which the school utilised the ceremonies for the purpose was by inviting ex-students who were doing well in their fields as guests of honour to provide motivational speeches at the ceremonies. That the events served their purpose was conveyed by various interviewee responses, including the following by a student:
Prize-giving Day pays homage to those who have performed well academically and with cultural activities that they have participated in. This helps them (students) to have the strength to carry on and do well in their futures.
Initiation name-calling
Name-calling was one other ritual that provided the school with strategies for initiating new students into the school's culture. Although this form was not exactly enjoyable to newcomers it did help bring about desired actions by prompting the newcomers to conform to the school's way of doing things in an effort to escape the name-calling. The following responses hinted at the practice's effects on newcomers:
Student 1: But there is sometimes discrimination, you find that pupils in higher classes treat students in Gr. 8 as if they are children, they don't respect them cause they have just arrived here at school and they know nothing. This is what I have noticed. Even teachers do this. For example the way they speak to these students shows that they don't respect them, they speak anyhow and call them names, e.g.
Mafikizolo (literally meaning those that arrived yesterday/Newcomers)!
Student 2: They also call them goalkeepers, strange names. But new comers have a tendency to be naughty; they don't want to respect those that have been here longer.
They want it to seem as though they have been here for a while so they can get used to things. But they should be looking at how those that have been here for a while do things.
Student 3: It used to upset me, but then I realized that I was new and had to look to others how things were done. I do the same to those who came after me, but I tell them that the same happened to me.
'EFFECTS' ON FEELINGS AND ACTIONS RELATED TO ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE
An examination of the above discussion reveals that what was enabling about the Fundiseka school culture were feelings that the culture brought about amongst the school's community. The feelings then resulted in practices that made it possible for the school not only to achieve good performance in academic activities but also in all of the school's activities. Important about these for this study are assumptions about the enabling capacity of the feelings and associated practices.