26 From Hard Copy to Digital Portfolios: Pedagogical Rituals, Resistance, and the Reconfiguration of Teaching Practice Files at a University of Technology

Clive Jimmy William Brown
Cape Peninsula University of Technology

ABSTRACT

This chapter critically interrogates the ideological, pedagogical, and institutional dynamics underpinning the transition from hard-copy to digital, and subsequently back to hard-copy—Teaching Practice (TP) files within a South African University of Technology (UoT). Situated against the backdrop of COVID-19 disruptions and the institution’s Vision 2030 transformation agenda, it reframes the TP file as more than a neutral repository of professional evidence, positioning it instead as an artefact deeply embedded in epistemological beliefs, ritualised academic practices, and power relations. Drawing on an autoethnographic account, theoretical frameworks on paradigm shifts, institutional rituals, and pedagogies of discomfort and care, as well as student-teacher feedback, the chapter examines how digital ePortfolios momentarily reconfigured notions of evidence, professionalism, and equity in teacher education. The post-pandemic reversion to hard-copy formats is analysed as a symbolic reclamation of institutional comfort zones, revealing tensions between innovation and tradition, efficiency and equity, and disruption and preservation. Through this analysis, the chapter contributes to debates on digital resilience, educational transformation, and the future of professional learning artefacts in unequal higher education contexts.

Keywords: Digital resilience, Teaching Practice (TP) files, Pedagogies of discomfort and care, Universities of Technology (UoTs), Educational transformation, Institutional rituals

INTRODUCTION

This chapter offers a critical exploration of the evolving nature of Teaching Practice (TP) assessment within a University of Technology (UoT). More specifically, a University of Technology with historical roots as a Technikon. A Technikon was a distinct type of South African post-secondary institution that existed prior to 2005. It focused on vocational and career-oriented education, with an emphasis on applied learning and preparing graduates for specific professions, particularly in technical and industrial fields. As Winberg (2005, p. 3) explains, Technikons evolved through several phases, from institutions designed to meet industrial labour needs to ones that began to imitate universities and finally to institutions seeking a unique identity. This evolution laid the groundwork for what later became the Universities of Technology in South Africa.

The COVID-19 pandemic precipitated a significant epistemological belief shift in the management and submission of TP portfolios for Intermediate Phase (IP) undergraduate students, catalysing a temporary move from hard-copy to digital formats. Before the pandemic, students compiled extensive TP files in physical form, including lesson plans, assessment artefacts, and reflective entries. This undertaking was logistically demanding, particularly for those in under-resourced communities or remote teaching contexts. However, pandemic-induced lockdowns necessitated an urgent digital turn, prompting the adoption of ePortfolios and the use of platforms such as Google Drive for TP assessment.

While this shift initially appeared to be a practical and innovative solution, this chapter does not present a procedural account of these operations. Instead, it examines the transition from an academic, epistemological belief and ideological perspective, foregrounding how artefacts like TP files are not neutral content repositories but are deeply embedded with institutional values, assumptions about pedagogy, and visions of the teacher subject. The move from hard copy to digital, followed by a post-pandemic reversion to physical files, is situated here not as a mere logistical or administrative adjustment but as a site of ideological contestation and pedagogical reconfiguration. The temporary shift to ePortfolios not only streamlined administrative processes and enhanced digital literacy among students and academics but also raised critical questions regarding equity, access, authenticity, surveillance, and the nature of evidence in professional learning.

In post-apartheid South Africa, educational transformation cannot be delinked from questions of ideology, power, identity, and the epistemological beliefs that shape what is considered valid knowledge within educational spaces (Foucault, 1972). Thus, the chapter asserts that the TP file, as an institutional artefact, embodies broader debates about control, accountability, and the future of teaching files, especially in a 21^st-century classroom. It argues that managing such artefacts, especially when subjected to shifts catalysed by crises, must be interrogated through deeper epistemological and pedagogical lenses. This is especially urgent in unequal contexts, where digital interventions can liberate and marginalise.

To this end, the chapter briefly presents an overview of the historical and institutional context and the researcher’s positionality for framing the digital transition as an ideological and pedagogical intervention. The chapter also engages with conceptual frameworks relevant to educational change, drawing on theories of paradigm shifts, institutional rituals and transformative practice and examines the university’s initial turn toward digitisation during the COVID-19 pandemic, tracing the unexpected reversion to hard-copy files post-pandemic, raising critical questions about institutional memory, the durability of transformation, and the embeddedness of academic rituals.

The chapter then concludes with arguments that decisions around artefacts like TP files are deeply ideological and must be continuously interrogated if universities genuinely transform towards more just, equitable, and future-responsive practices.

In offering this analysis, the chapter aims to contribute to broader scholarly conversations about digital resilience in teacher education and provide insight into how pedagogical artefacts can serve as entry points for rethinking educational transformation in ordinary and extraordinary times.

FRAMING THE INQUIRY: CONTEXT, RATIONALE, AND STRUCTURE

This chapter draws on an interdisciplinary conceptual framework that views educational artefacts—notably teaching practice (TP) files—as symbolic texts embedded within ideological, epistemological, and institutional discourses. According to Mäkelä (2007), artefacts are not merely end products but serve as both the process and outcome of inquiry, embodying knowledge that emerges through making. This perspective aligns with the aim of this chapter, which emphasises the ideological and pedagogical dimensions of teaching practice files, framing them as artefacts that encapsulate and convey educational values and practices. Central to this framing are three interwoven concepts: ideological embeddedness (Cross, 1999), ritualised practice (Maloney, 2000; Giroux & McLaren, 1986), and pedagogical epistemology (Chen, 2025). This collective framing naturally extends into a broader reflection on how South Africa’s socio-historical context continues to shape educational artefacts and practices.

First, South Africa has a rich history of dwelling on the past, which becomes evident in the regurgitation of the historicity of this land (Jansen, 2024). These recurring narratives are often mobilised to foreground unresolved tensions, injustices, and socio-political fractures that continue to shape contemporary educational discourses (Samuel, 2012). As such, the past is not merely remembered but actively reinterpreted to inform ideological, epistemological, and pedagogical commitments in the present (Bertram, 2020; Popkewitz, 2009). The notion of ideological embeddedness suggests that educational artefacts, such as TP files, are not neutral tools but carriers of implicit values, assumptions, and power relations. The shift to digital platforms during the COVID-19 pandemic was, therefore, not simply a pragmatic response but a reconfiguration of how professional learning, surveillance, and evidence are conceived and controlled within teacher education (Beetham, Collier, Czerniewicz, Lamb, Lin, Ross & Wilson, 2022; Knox, Williamson & Bayne, 2020).

Second, ritualised practice speaks to the repetitive, taken-for-granted academic procedures, such as the collation, printing, and physical assessment of TP files—that produce a sense of continuity, legitimacy, and institutional identity (Alton, Auxtova, O’Rourke, Tanner, Drummond, Duggan & Jooss, 2024; Maloney, 2000). The reversion to hard-copy post-pandemic can thus be read as reclaiming established pedagogical rituals that offer familiarity and symbolic grounding in uncertain times (Bertram & Christiansen, 2014; Struthers, Dupuis & Eaton, 2005).

Third, the framework draws on a pedagogical epistemology that critiques how knowledge is constructed, validated, and assessed within teaching practicum contexts (Brown & Dippenaar, 2024; Brown, 2022). The digitalisation of TP files challenges traditional conceptions of what counts as legitimate evidence of teaching practice. It raises questions about student agency, digital literacy, and the role of ePortfolios in fostering reflective professionalism (Brody, Mayo-Smith, Ngan, Hou, Gupta, Dupuy & Abbott, 2001; Piraino, Recht & Richmond, 1997).

Together, these concepts position the digital transition not as an operational adjustment but a deeply contested site of educational meaning-making, ripe for critical interrogation (Samuel, 2014). The chapter adopts this lens to foreground the epistemic, political, and pedagogical stakes in how TP files are conceptualised, designed and assessed.

Context

The global COVID-19 pandemic significantly disrupted established norms within higher education, compelling institutions worldwide to reconfigure both their pedagogical frameworks and administrative systems. In South Africa, this disruption manifested acutely within the Faculties of Education, where the imperative of ensuring continuity in professional teacher preparation collided with new public health directives and the sudden pivot to remote and digital learning modes. At the institution where I am employed—operating across two distinct campuses, one in an urban setting and the other in a rural area—this transition necessitated an urgent recalibration of the traditional approach to Teaching Practice (TP).

Historically, TP at the UoT relied heavily on using hard-copy files to document student-teacher planning, reflection, and assessment processes. However, in response to the constraints imposed by the COVID-19 lockdowns and regulations issued by the Department of Basic Education (DBE, 2020) during the global pandemic, the faculty was compelled to digitise its TP processes. This included transitioning the teaching practice file from a tangible, physical artefact to a digital format—a shift aligned with broader moves in the sector (Jansen & Farmer-Phillips, 2021; Robinson & Rusznyak, 2020). The urgency of this transformation revealed longstanding tensions within institutional logic, technological readiness, and pedagogical assumptions.

As the Intermediate Phase Teaching Practice Coordinator based at the urban campus, I was thrust into a leadership position at a moment of crisis. My role, alongside those of my colleagues—both full-time and part-time TP evaluators—was to ensure that this digital transition was administratively efficient and pedagogically sound. However, moving from the familiar paper-based model to a digital system introduced new complexities for student-teachers and academics within my department. My leadership came under scrutiny as we navigated unfamiliar digital terrain, often with uneven support and disparate levels of digital literacy among staff and students.

This personal-professional moment was rendered even more poignant by my positionality. Being a student-teacher at the same institution (then known as Technikon) between 2003 and 2007, I was intimately familiar with the traditional TP file construction processes. Once a strength, that familiarity became a source of tension as I was required to lead a paradigm shift away from the legacy systems I had once embodied. The process thus demanded technical reconfiguration and a profound epistemological and cultural shift within TP’s institutional memory and practices.

Rationale

This section critically explores the digitisation of teaching practice (TP) files as both a necessary institutional response to the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and as a catalyst for reimagining the epistemic, administrative, and professional foundations of teacher education at the University of Technology (UoT) in South Africa. The transition from paper-based TP artefacts to digital portfolios was not merely a technical adjustment but an ontological and pedagogical shift with far-reaching implications for how student-teachers engage with their learning, how lecturers facilitate professional development and how institutions envision their social and academic responsibilities (Naidoo & Wagner, 2020; Mukeredzi, 2017; Mukeredzi & Mandrona, 2013).

In traditional contexts, TP files served as structured, physical records of compliance, often shaped by technikon-era practices grounded in manual processes and rigid evaluation rubrics. These artefacts reinforced a mechanistic, operational approach to teacher preparation, where lecturers steered much of the thinking and where independent, critical reflection was limited (Winberg, 2005). However, the pandemic disrupted this continuity, challenging institutions to reconfigure TP administration and pedagogy in line with remote learning conditions, government regulations (DBE, 2020), and global imperatives for transformation. This reconfiguration necessitated a move from what I refer to as “a technikon mentality—anchored in bureaucratic, analogue models of teaching and learning—toward a university mentality that foregrounds professional autonomy, technological fluency, and critical engagement” (Brown, 2022, p. 8).

As the Intermediate Phase TP Co-ordinator based at UoT’s urban campus, I found myself at the intersection of institutional expectation, pedagogical reinvention, and leadership accountability. My position as a former student-teacher trained under the Technikon system (2003–2007) and a current academic responsible for implementing digital transformation offered a unique vantage point to interrogate this transition. While my deep familiarity with TP file construction initially seemed like a strength, it quickly became a point of dissonance as I had to lead colleagues through unsettling old certainties and embrace new, untested digital engagement models. Many staff members—often themselves products of teacher colleges and technikons—grappled with the discomfort of leaving behind familiar pedagogies and assessment practices (Brown, 2022; Winberg, 2005) by entering a terrain that demanded digital confidence, pedagogical agility, and a reimagining of professional judgement (Selwyn, 2019; Foulger, Graziano, Schmidt-Crawford, & Slykhuis, 2017).

Institutional drivers also accelerated the move toward digitalisation. During the COVID-19 lockdown, when physical campuses were deserted for extended periods, cost efficiencies became visible: reductions in photocopying, paper consumption, printer maintenance, and other operational expenditures brought new insights into sustainable practices. Simultaneously, the UoT invested in digital professional learning initiatives to enable staff to utilise tools such as e-Signatures, electronic submissions, and online feedback platforms—thereby embedding digital literacy and operational streamlining into everyday academic routines. This shift aligned with the vision of the context, which speaks about a Vision 2030: Institutional Transformation Framework – No One Left Behind, which foregrounds two strategic pillars: Oneness and Smartness (CPUT, Vision 2030, 2021, p. 5–7):

Transformation is anchored in “ONE SMART CPUT”, which incorporates ‘oneness’ and ‘smartness’ as key dimensions supporting the smart university concept. From a transformation perspective, ‘oneness’ refers to the degree of social integration and inclusion in university communities and the extent to which mutual solidarity finds expression among staff and students as individuals and as members of society. On the other hand, ‘smartness’ includes working together for the attainment of shared goals, designed and agreed upon to ensure student and staff centrism. The CPUT community is united in acknowledging that we have diverse origins, histories, languages, cultures, religions and other identities. Further, it continues to make progress on its digital transformation journey to ensure that there is no social, cultural or economic divide and that ‘no one is left behind’ through digital participation.

The former speaks to social inclusion and mutual solidarity across staff and students within the conceptual framing of Oneness and Smartness. At the same time, the latter signals a commitment to technologically enabled, student-centred learning (CPUT, Vision2030, p. 5). The institution’s belief in human-centric digitalisation emphasises technological empowerment and the holistic development of staff and students within a framework guided by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (CPUT, Vision2030, 2021, p. 7).

Despite these advancements, significant gaps remain unaddressed in both policy and practice. Existing literature often under-theorises how digital infrastructures reconfigure the epistemological authority of lecturers, the professional identities of student-teachers, and the institutional power dynamics embedded in teaching practice assessment (Jansen, 2023; Brown, 2022; Amin, Samuel & Dhunpath, 2016). Moreover, the digitisation of TP files, especially within UoTs, has not received sustained critical attention regarding how it affects supervision, the cultivation of reflective practitioners, and the potential for emancipatory pedagogies. Institutional policy remains silent regarding support structures for digital transitions, particularly for part-time staff and students from under-resourced communities, raising concerns about digital equity and access.

This chapter thus contributes to emerging scholarship that views crisis not merely as disruption but as an opportunity to reimagine professional learning infrastructure. A case-based analysis of the TP file transformation at a UoT offers practitioner insights and conceptual reflections on digital pedagogies, institutional change, and the leadership challenges of enacting innovation under conditions of uncertainty. In doing so, it situates itself within the broader conversation on transformative higher education in the Global South, particularly within post-pandemic realities where universities must balance agility with care and technology with equity (Czerniewicz, 2020; Bozkurt, Jung, Xiao, Vladimirschi, Schuwer, Egorov & Paskevicius, 2020; Luckett & Shay, 2017).

The digitisation of TP files holds tensions and affordances: while it enhances the flexibility, accessibility, and immediacy of supervision and feedback, it also demands that institutions revisit their assumptions about teaching, learning, and professional accountability. In teacher education specifically, this shift has the potential to enhance critical reflection, decentralize authority, and promote authentic professional learning—if implemented thoughtfully and with adequate support (Aktaş, Wong, Kong & Ho, 2025; Luckett & Shay, 2017).

In writing this chapter, I draw on my emic position as both a coordinator and former student-teacher to offer a reflective, situated account of institutional change. This positionality enables a textured understanding of the legacy systems, the human dynamics of transformation, and the epistemic discomforts of transition. It also allows me to speak with authority and humility about the tensions between policy vision and practical enactment.

This chapter positions e-portfolios as both a lens and a practice in a University of Technology. It shows how moving from hard-copy files to e-portfolios redefined evidence of learning, feedback flows, and professional identity in WIL. Disruptions— infrastructural and compliance—are read as catalysts that exposed and strengthened e-portfolio resilience. Drawing on student-teacher, mentor, and supervisor accounts, I examine platform power (visibility, data ownership, transparency), pedagogical affordances for reflection and programmatic assessment, and organisational conditions for equitable, scalable ecosystems. The chapter concludes with design principles for implementing and sustaining resilient e-portfolios.

Informed by institutional documents, practitioner experiences, and relevant theoretical perspectives, this chapter contributes to a growing field of scholarship concerned with digital pedagogies, epistemic justice, and higher education transformation in post-COVID South Africa (Heeks, 2022; Walker, Martinez Vargas & Mkwananzi, 2020; Kumalo, 2018).

Structure

The chapter examines the digital transformation of teaching practice (TP) files within the Faculty of Education at a UoT in Cape Town, Western Cape. The chapter draws on various empirical and autoethnographic sources, including email correspondence, written reflections, and informal conversations with former student-teachers who have since graduated from the programme and colleagues who have retired, moved to other institutions, or exited the department. Given the temporal distance from the initial shift and the departure, retirement, or passing of many former staff members, this account is necessarily partial, constructed from the documents and narratives that could be ethically and practically sourced.

THEORETICAL FRAMING: PARADIGMS, RITUALS AND REVOLUTIONS

The transition from hard-copy to digital teaching practice (TP) files at this UoT represented more than a mere technical adjustment; it was a paradigmatic intervention into the ritualised workings of teacher education. While a global crisis prompted the shift, its implications reach far deeper, unsettling long-held assumptions about academic artefacts, institutional authority, and professional learning. Yet not all academic community members recognised this digital turn’s value. Both passive and explicit resistance signalled a deep attachment to the familiar, material rituals of documentation, assessment, and verification. For many, the hard-copy TP file was a tool and symbol of academic seriousness, pedagogical control, and institutional continuity. Yuval Noah Harari is variously described as a public intellectual and historian of ideas who bridges academic scholarship and mass readership, a futurist or posthumanist thinker who provokes debate about human identity in technological contexts, and a critic of “Dataism” who warns against the ascendancy of algorithmic epistemologies over human agency (van Niekerk, 2020; Knox, 2019; Harari, 2015). Harari (2014) reminds us that:

One of history’s few iron laws is that luxuries tend to become necessities… Finally, they reach a point where they can’t live without it.

In this context, digital TP files were perceived not as necessary innovations but as temporary substitutes. The return to hard copy after the pandemic suggests reversing epistemic comfort and reclaiming rituals embedded in institutional culture. In the context of universities of Technology—spaces historically positioned as sites of innovation and praxis—the retreat from digital to hard-copy TP files reveals a disquieting paradox: the institutional valorisation of technological advancement collapses when confronted with pedagogical disruption, exposing a deeper allegiance to bureaucratic orthodoxy over transformative practice. The reclaiming of rituals through the actions of academics can be examined through the lenses of paradigmatic theories, institutional ritual studies, and educational change literature, which help unpack the complex dynamics at play. Within this framing, artefacts such as teaching practice (TP) files are revealed to be more than mere assessment instruments—they are ideologically charged, historically layered, and symbolically potent.

As Zembylas (2014) argues, a pedagogy of comfort resists disruption by privileging familiar practices that reproduce affective and epistemological safety. In this sense, the return to hard-copy files reflects institutional inertia and an emotional and political investment in preserving traditional hierarchies of knowing and doing. This affective attachment to comfort, as Boler and Zembylas (2003) suggest, is not benign—it functions to maintain existing epistemic regimes and to shield institutions from the discomfort of meaningful pedagogical transformation (Boler & Zembylas, 2003; Zembylas & Boler, 2002; Boler, 1999). The shift to digital platforms during COVID-19 disrupted this emotional and procedural equilibrium, directly challenging the technikon-era mentality of manual compliance and mechanised supervision. It invited a new paradigm rooted in reflexivity, agency, and digitally mediated professionalism. By engaging theories of paradigm shifts (Kuhn, 1997), institutional rituals (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983), and educational revolutions (Biesta, 1998; Freire, 1972; Freire, 1970), this section maps the terrain of pedagogical transition in a post-pandemic university of technology. It argues that what may seem like administrative or technological adjustments are, in fact, ideological battlegrounds over what constitutes meaningful preparation, legitimate evidence, and professional identity in teacher education (Cross & Ndofirepi, 2015).

The conceptual framework below, drawn from my recently completed doctoral study (Brown, 2022), offers a visual representation of the theoretical architecture underpinning how student teachers navigate shifting pedagogical spaces—namely, their movement from zones of comfort, through scaffolded support structures, and ultimately toward a pedagogy of disruption. This framework captures the internal trajectories of student learning and mirrors broader institutional dynamics. The shift from hard copy to digital was not merely a technical adjustment; it constituted an ideological confrontation—a moment that demanded both disruption and reimagination. Institutional reactions to this shift—whether marked by resistance, compliance, or retreat—are not neutral responses but reveal deeper affective and epistemic commitments to preserving or transforming the existing educational order.

The transition from hard-copy to digital TP files at this University of Technology must be understood as an operational or technical shift and a deeply contested pedagogical and ideological rupture. It exposed fault lines in institutional culture, revealing how entrenched attachments to tradition, authority, and epistemic comfort can impede meaningful transformation. As the post-pandemic terrain of teacher education continues to evolve (Samuel, 2021), the challenge lies not in choosing between old and new formats but in confronting the deeper paradigms that shape what is considered legitimate knowledge, valid evidence, and professional learning. By naming and theorising these tensions, this chapter foregrounds the critical imperative to move beyond comfort—to disrupt inherited rituals and reimagine practice in reflexive, agentic, and socially just ways.

THE DIGITAL TURN AT A UoT: A REVOLUTIONARY SHIFT?

When exploring the readiness of Universities of Technology (UoTs) to enact a truly transformative, paradigm-shifting digital turn on the ground, it is essential to recognise how this stirs profound and contentious debates about the nature and purpose of public higher education in South Africa. Many institutions now classified as UoTs underwent nominal rebranding without meaningful shifts in their internal structures. As prominent researchers in higher education argue, South African universities still have much to learn about the true purpose of a university (Hungwe & Waghid, 2024; Kumalo, 2018; Waghid, 2008). As asserted by Hungwe and Waghid (2024, p. 1):

Universities are continuously redefining and reconfiguring in search of social identity and relevance. It is for this reason that compelling processes, such as decolonisation, transformation and other university reform initiatives, are underscored by the imperative of pursuing contextual meaning and relevance.

In the words of Vale and Boyte (2019), echoing a growing chorus of South African critics, a university is not merely a factory for credentials or research outputs, but an organ of civic purpose and community partnership. In this locus, scholarship is harnessed for the public good and democratic engagement. This default is symptomatic of what Ryan and Markova (2006) term the pedagogy of comfort, as opposed to wherein institutional actors seek affective and cognitive sanctuary in the known, avoiding the unsettling work of disruption (Zembylas & Papamichael, 2017; Zembylas & McGlynn, 2012). In UoTs, the reversion to hard-copy TP files exemplifies this effect: the semblance of stability and academic professionalism again takes precedence over the discomfort of reimagining professional practice.

Conversely, Zembylas’s (2015) pedagogy of discomfort demands that we sit with unease such that it becomes a catalyst for critical reflection, disrupting normative hierarchies of power and knowledge. Yet the institutional appetite for discomfort appears limited: digital transitions are tolerated only insofar as they do not threaten existing administrative control or academic comfort zones (Samuel, Dhunpath & Amin, 2017).

Institutional ritual theory (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983) helps us understand that such inertia is not accidental but reinforced by normative and mimetic isomorphic pressures within higher education. These pressures create an environment where compliance is valorised, and innovation remains carefully circumscribed. Moving beyond explanation, pedagogies of discomfort invite us to question who is at ease and who is excluded by current rituals. In UoTs, the predominance of hard-copy systems perpetuates material and epistemic privileges, replicating patterns of inequality that extend far beyond the classroom (Samuel, 2021; Zembylas, 2014).

Samuel’s (2022) research titled No student left behind: ‘Pedagogies of comfort’ or ‘pedagogies of disruption’? suggests that crises can catalyse transformative pedagogy if institutions resist defaulting to comfort and instead scaffold staff and students through the discomfort of change. He observes that digital transition initiatives “were often resisted, even by those they were meant to empower,” as participants retreated to familiar frameworks when challenged (Samuel, 2022, p. 19). This resistance highlights the gap between institutional readiness and actual transformation. Even well-intentioned policy directives can falter when local rituals reassert themselves, reproducing technikon-era dispositions. To truly enact a digital revolution, UoTs must embed structures of support that prepare stakeholders for discomfort, not merely in training workshops, but through sustained collegial inquiry, critical reflection sessions, and a shift in reward systems.

Moreover, the engagement with discomfort must be accompanied by pedagogical care. As Zembylas (2023) proposes, an ethic of discomfort must be paired with an ethic of care to ensure that challenge does not become trauma (Zembylas, 2023). Within South African UoTs, this dual approach is urgent given the legacies of unequal schooling and resource disparities (Spaull & Jansen, 2019; Spaull, 2013; Van der Berg, Burger, Burger, de Vos, du Rand, Gustafsson, & von Fintel, 2011).

Critically, the emergence of “zones of fear” in new pedagogical practice (Samuel, 2022) offers a productive space for change, but only when carefully scaffolded and when discomfort is framed as generative rather than punitive.

However, one might argue that the rapid return to hard-copy materials signals that UoTs lacked the structural capacity to sustain digital transformation. This suggests systemic under-resourcing, rather than ideological resistance alone, constrains innovation. Supporters of the digital turn point to pandemic disruptions as rare opportunities to break the ritual cycle. Yet, digital divides in South Africa mean that such reforms risk exacerbating inequities, unless carefully mediated.

Additionally, academic identity and status—shaped by years of ritualised practice—are threatened by digital formats, which are often perceived as less serious or rigorous. The status anxiety this generates can powerfully drive institutional retreat (Scanlon, 2018; Becher & Trowler, 2001). Nevertheless, pockets of innovation exist where academics, mobilised by critical purpose, have begun to co-create digitally mediated pedagogies that foreground agency, reflexivity, and collaboration across hierarchical divides.

These pockets suggest that the ideological battleground is by no means uniformly won: UoTs can and do host agents of disruption, though these remain vulnerable and often marginal, lacking formal institutional support. Ultimately, the shift from hard-copy to digital in UoTs represents a ritual disruption and a test of institutional readiness to confront discomfort. The stakes are high: without embracing both pedagogies of discomfort and care, UoT’s risk is reaffirming the very epistemic regimes they seek to transcend.

REVERSION TO HARD COPY: RITUALS RECLAIMED

This section explores the paradoxical movement from digital innovation to traditional hard-copy TP documentation within a University of Technology context. Drawing on a lecturer’s self-reflective account—rooted in work across both Foundation Phase and Intermediate Phase Studies—of the COVID-19-triggered shift to digital ePortfolios alongside recent feedback from student-teachers, it becomes evident that this reversion is not merely logistical or administrative. Instead, it represents a deeper reclaiming of institutional rituals and epistemic comfort embedded within teacher education practices. The tensions between the promise of digitally mediated flexibility and the persistent realities of infrastructural inequality, administrative burden, and affective attachment to paper-based systems highlight the contested nature of educational transformation. This reclamation signals resistance to and negotiation with disruption, underscoring the need for equitable, pedagogically sound approaches as the sector navigates its post-pandemic future.

A lecturer’s self-reflective interpretation of the transition from hard copy to online.

Excerpt from email correspondence — Dr Adam focusing on COVID-19, Feedback on TP ePortfolio Process

The implementation of a digital ePortfolio submission process, particularly via Google Drive, was an adaptive and contextually appropriate response to the disruptions of COVID-19. At St. Paul’s Campus of the UoT, this approach enabled continued assessment of professional practice despite the suspension of physical engagement.

Logistically, the system streamlined access and moderation, encouraged flexible engagement, and allowed for improved record-keeping with potential long-term quality assurance benefits. Pedagogically, the model promoted reflective practice and digital literacy, introducing student-teachers to contemporary forms of professional documentation.

However, the shift also exposed stark digital inequalities. Students from rural or under-resourced areas struggled with connectivity, device access, and high data costs, compromising their participation. Many lacked basic digital skills and received limited structured support, increasing their cognitive and emotional burden during an already taxing period.

As we consider its future use, the ePortfolio model must centre equity, provide structured training for both students and staff, and be pedagogically integrated rather than merely administrative. A blended, flexible approach may offer the most responsive way forward.

Dr. Adam’s self-reflective account offers a valuable insider perspective on how digital ePortfolios functioned as both a pragmatic response to pandemic disruptions and a pedagogical innovation within a UoT context (Biswas, 2024; Modise & Mudau, 2023). His reflection highlights digital platforms’ logistical efficiencies, pedagogical potential, and the structural inequities shaping uneven student participation. These tensions between innovation and exclusion underscore why, for some institutions, the return to hard-copy formats was perceived as a reclaiming of control, familiarity, and institutional ritual. Thus, the reversion emerges not as a neutral administrative shift but as an affective and ideological move that reasserts the epistemic comfort of paper-based practices in the face of digital disruption.

Student-Teachers’ Reflections on the Transition from Hard Copy to Online—Selected responses from IP Year Four students via Google Questionnaire on the COVID-19 TP ePortfolio process.

The following anonymised responses were drawn from IP Year Four students via a Google questionnaire, offering insight into the challenges and suggestions surrounding TP documentation during the first semester of 2025. While similar concerns emerged during the emergency shift to online platforms in the COVID-19 era, these particular responses are drawn from students who entered the Initial Teacher Education (ITE) programme in 2022. As the first cohort to begin their studies fully post-pandemic, their reflections are especially important for understanding the enduring challenges and potential pathways forward. Their responses highlight ongoing concerns about accessibility, administrative burden, and the financial strain of teaching practice compliance, underscoring the need for systemic and pedagogical reform.

Theme One: Suggestions for Streamlining TP Documentation for Students
Students expressed frustration with the volume of required printing and the lack of an integrated digital platform. Key suggestions included:

“Too many things to print.”

“Use Blackboard.”

“Create a centralised online platform (e.g., Moodle, Google Classroom, or the university Learning Management System [LMS]) where all documents are stored, clearly categorised and easily accessible.”

Theme Two: Suggestions for Streamlining TP Documentation for Mentor Teachers
Students were concerned about the administrative overload placed on mentor teachers and its implications for meaningful engagement:

“The TP administrator can email all mentor-teacher-related documents to the school.”

“Move towards digital evaluation forms.”

“The Teaching Practice Co-ordinator can adapt some documents to ensure that mentor teachers aren’t overburdened.”

“All my mentor teachers didn’t complete 70% of the comments on either the lesson plan or the rubric.”

“There’s no need to ask mentor teachers to write feedback on each and every lesson plan and evaluation form—it’s a lot of work. Most wait until the last day to fill in everything.”

Theme Three: Suggestions Regarding Printing of TP Documents
Concerns around affordability and access to printing resources were widespread:

“The university should print out TP documents.”

“The campus should ensure that its computers and printing devices work at all times.”

“Can we not just go paperless? E-file?”

“TP documentation is nothing compared to the amount of paper that we pay for when it comes to resources and lesson plans. And then the new document of an essay after each lesson plan—TP is very expensive.”

CONCLUSION

This chapter has demonstrated that seemingly technical decisions about artefacts such as teaching practice files are, in fact, profoundly ideological, shaping whose knowledge counts, how professional identity is constructed, and which pedagogies are legitimised. If South African universities—especially Universities of Technology—are to fulfil their historic mandate as social justice and innovation engines, these material practices must be continuously scrutinised and reimagined.

Yet, too many institutions remain mired in outdated rituals and bureaucratic inertia, perpetuating a second-hand education for the most marginalised and indigent students. This complacency risks entrenching patterns of exclusion and reproducing epistemic injustice under the guise of tradition. The challenge is clear: transformation requires not only the adoption of new technologies or policies but also a radical pedagogical rupture that unsettles comfort zones, disrupts inherited hierarchies, and foregrounds student agency and equity.

Universities must choose—will they be complicit in maintaining a status quo that privileges form over substance, ritual over relevance, and exclusion over inclusion? Or will they embrace a courageous reimagining of professional learning spaces that genuinely serve the futures of all South African developing student-teachers? The answer to this question will define the trajectory of higher education in this country for decades.

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AUTHOR

Dr Clive Jimmy William Brown is a lecturer in the Faculty of Education at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology, South Africa, where he serves as the Intermediate Phase Teaching Practice Co-ordinator. He holds a PhD in Higher Education from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, with research focusing on the power dynamics experienced by student-teachers during practicum placements in South African primary schools. His scholarly interests include teacher education, digital transformation, pedagogical rituals, academic precarity, and epistemic justice. Dr Brown is a TAU Fellow, a certified doctoral supervisor across Africa, and an editorial board member of Transformation in Higher Education. His work integrates critical, autoethnographic, and case study methodologies to interrogate the intersections of ideology, pedagogy, and institutional change in higher education.
Email: browncl@cput.ac.za