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Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa

This qualitative, inductive dissertation explores a social enterprise’s management of for-profit and not-for-profit missions administered through different programmes. Ineffective balancing negatively impacted the design, development, and implementation strategy of an education technology (EDTech) t...

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Main Author: Nimmo, Peter
Other Authors: Giamporcaro, Stephanie
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: Graduate School of Business (GSB) 2019
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access_status_str Open Access
author Nimmo, Peter
author2 Giamporcaro, Stephanie
author_browse Giamporcaro, Stephanie
Nimmo, Peter
author_facet Giamporcaro, Stephanie
Nimmo, Peter
author_sort Nimmo, Peter
collection Thesis
description This qualitative, inductive dissertation explores a social enterprise’s management of for-profit and not-for-profit missions administered through different programmes. Ineffective balancing negatively impacted the design, development, and implementation strategy of an education technology (EDTech) trial in no-fee government schools in Mpumalanga, South Africa intended to fund a non-profit music academy. This study builds upon existing literature in information technology management; the implications of managing multiple missions in social enterprises; as well as technology design and development theory. These are used to offer a descriptive account of limited/non-use of education technology in areas facing deep rooted inequalities. Through adopting a qualitative methodology using semi-structured interviews, observation, and document analysis; rich data was gathered to construct three case studies of individual schools. These case studies are compared to the expectations and reflections of the social enterprise’s board and management in light of limited/non use of EDTech. The research finds high degrees of nuance between schools; even within 5 Kilometres of each other. Such nuance is reflected in uneven provision of devices, educational resources, and infrastructure; varying technology integration strategies between schools; in addition to the individualistic sensemaking of education technology by teachers. This research provides a rich example of the difficulty for social enterprises in balancing disintegrated social and commercial value chains. This increases the risk of such organisations ineffectively allocating resources by prioritising speculative financial gain over social impact; resulting in failure to achieve multiple, differentiated missions.
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institution University of Cape Town (South Africa)
language eng
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:34:56.168Z
license_str Not specified — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
publishDate 2019
publishDateRange 2019
publishDateSort 2019
publisher Graduate School of Business (GSB)
publisherStr Graduate School of Business (GSB)
record_format dspace
source_str UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
spelling oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/30037 Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa Nimmo, Peter Giamporcaro, Stephanie This qualitative, inductive dissertation explores a social enterprise’s management of for-profit and not-for-profit missions administered through different programmes. Ineffective balancing negatively impacted the design, development, and implementation strategy of an education technology (EDTech) trial in no-fee government schools in Mpumalanga, South Africa intended to fund a non-profit music academy. This study builds upon existing literature in information technology management; the implications of managing multiple missions in social enterprises; as well as technology design and development theory. These are used to offer a descriptive account of limited/non-use of education technology in areas facing deep rooted inequalities. Through adopting a qualitative methodology using semi-structured interviews, observation, and document analysis; rich data was gathered to construct three case studies of individual schools. These case studies are compared to the expectations and reflections of the social enterprise’s board and management in light of limited/non use of EDTech. The research finds high degrees of nuance between schools; even within 5 Kilometres of each other. Such nuance is reflected in uneven provision of devices, educational resources, and infrastructure; varying technology integration strategies between schools; in addition to the individualistic sensemaking of education technology by teachers. This research provides a rich example of the difficulty for social enterprises in balancing disintegrated social and commercial value chains. This increases the risk of such organisations ineffectively allocating resources by prioritising speculative financial gain over social impact; resulting in failure to achieve multiple, differentiated missions. 2019-05-10T11:51:43Z 2019-05-10T11:51:43Z 2018 2019-05-07T11:19:49Z Master Thesis Masters MPhil http://hdl.handle.net/11427/30037 eng application/pdf Graduate School of Business (GSB) Faculty of Commerce
spellingShingle Nimmo, Peter
Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa
thesis_degree_str Master's
title Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa
title_full Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa
title_fullStr Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa
title_full_unstemmed Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa
title_short Chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant: Exploring limited/non-use of education technology in Mpumalanga, South Africa
title_sort chasing the white rabbit to find a white elephant exploring limited non use of education technology in mpumalanga south africa
url http://hdl.handle.net/11427/30037
work_keys_str_mv AT nimmopeter chasingthewhiterabbittofindawhiteelephantexploringlimitednonuseofeducationtechnologyinmpumalangasouthafrica