Abstract & Overview

I will be presenting at SAERA 2026 on ongoing collaborative research concerned with the future of digital teacher education across African higher education contexts.

The presentation, Developing a Contextually Responsive Framework for Engaging and Inclusive Digital Teacher Education Across African Universities, examines an important challenge: How can universities prepare future teachers for increasingly digital classrooms while ensuring that digital education remains engaging, inclusive, and responsive to the realities of African educational contexts?

Rather than assuming that models of digital teacher education can be universally applied, this work recognises the considerable diversity that exists across African universities and schooling systems. Differences in infrastructure, connectivity, institutional capacity, student access, digital competencies and local educational priorities all influence what meaningful digital teacher preparation looks like in practice.

The research therefore works towards a contextually responsive framework for engaging and inclusive digital teacher education, informed by evidence and experiences across participating African university contexts.

This work forms part of a broader commitment to preparing future teachers not simply to use digital technologies, but to make thoughtful pedagogical decisions about how technologies, AI and open resources can support meaningful, equitable and inclusive learning.

SAERA 2026 provides an important opportunity to share the developing framework, engage with the wider education research community and strengthen its conceptual and practical foundations.