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Abstract
This Systems Approach Modeling Integral Action Research (SAMIAR) Cardinal and Morin (1994) take its place
in the context of the reconstruction of education in the Democratic Republic of Congo, more precisely in the
province of South Kivu. Indeed, reducing the gap between curriculum requirements, and social needs that
secondary technical and vocational education should meet, is the main concern of this study. This gap is
reflected in terms of mismatch between the needs of society and the teaching curriculum on the one hand, and
on the other hand, in terms of lack of consistency between the skills in technical and vocational secondary
education skills for the labor market.
The literature about the development of the educational curriculum in various contexts, mainly in post-war
contexts, has revealed how the beneficiaries and educational actors evolve in educational curriculum
development (OECD, 1995; Lenoir and Bouillier-Oudot, 2006; Goddard, 2007; Trabelsi and Dubois, 2006;
Benavente, 2006; Obura, 2003; Sinclair, 2005).
The theoretical framework, symbolic interactionism (Coulon, 1993, Le Breton, 2004) supported by systems
thinking (Bausch, 2001; Checkland, 1981; Lapointe, 1995; Morin, 2010) has allowed us to understand how,
from the experiences and the visions of beneficiaries and the actors of teaching, can we develop and/or adjust
the technical and vocational secondary education curriculum, and develop guiding principles of an action plan
and its implementation to meet the emerging needs in the province of South Kivu in the post-war context.
We use the Soft Systems Methodology to understand the complexity of the problem situation of education in
South Kivu. Using two research techniques: focus groups and participation in the Round Table, we obtained
results that meet our research objectives. These results relate to the visions of education and skills
development in the teaching curriculum to meet emerging needs: need peace, social security, socio-economic
and educational needs. Finally, the perceptions of the actors on the problematic situation of teaching were
used to update the action changes to the education curriculum. To improve the current situation map, we have
developed guiding principles for the design and implementation of action of a South Kivu technical and
vocational education curriculum.