School monitoring, support no longer functional

Taking a cue from the Ontario framework on school governance, the 2014 Jaap Kuiper study on low student achievement levels in our public schools underscored the intimacy between school governance and student learning outcomes. The common denominator between the Ontario school leadership framework and the Kuiper study is that effective teaching and learning can only take root and blossom in a setting in which school managers assume an active and prominent role in the classroom affairs.

Learners and teachers cannot be expected to thrive and accomplish learning and teaching tasks in an environment where those who are supposed to be leading and championing the cause of students’ learning choose to take the back seat and relegate matters of instruction into the background. The one thing Professor Kuiper found conspicuously absent in our jurisdiction is a document spelling out professional standards for teachers and school managers. Kuiper strongly felt that “a document spelling out Professional Standards for School Heads might be of use here. This should describe in practical and context-based examples what managers are expected to be able to do. It should include information about all the different operational areas of the school: teaching, teachers, assessment, hostel, kitchen, library, IT, other resources, finance, strategic planning, school development planning, in-school quality assurance, meetings, agendas, minute-taking, communicating to different audiences (teachers, students, parents, Region, etc.), conflict resolution, team building.” And this factor alone (absence of standards) could be responsible many maladies afflicting system.

The absence of professional standards has far reaching implications. First, it means principals are deployed to take charge of their troops on the ground without a compass and training on what they are expected to do. Secondly, without standards it is difficult to hold classroom practitioners and school managers accountable for what is happening in the classrooms and schools. This factor alone (absence of standards) explains why public schools though sponsored and patronised by the same government experience mixed fortunes and continue to display distinct traits and varying levels of professionalism. Many are struggling while a few are doing well. The leadership factor distinguishes two schools located in the same locality from one another. Even without the benefit of professional standards a few talented school leaders have defied odds and are credited with leading successful schools.

One such school leader is Dr Bathusi Monkge. Basing on Monkge’s success story, in the midst of adversity, one can safely conclude that to a large extent the character of schools rests on the character, wisdom and administrative acumen of individual leaders. For example, the character of Monkge’s led schools was very distinct from the one governed by his peers. Monkge’s name is synonymous with academic excellence. His success story was characterised by inheriting chronically low performing schools of Bokamoso Junior Secondary School and Ledumang Senior Secondary School in Gaborone and Seepapitso Senior Secondary School in Kanye and transforming them into top notch and high achieving schools. His magic was universally applicable, working wonders for both rural and urban schools.

He had his own peculiar and unparalleled panacea, which sufficiently challenged and motivated teachers, students and ancillary staff to bring their best selves to work. But the most interesting development across the schools he led is that his successors did not manage to repeat the feat and glory he bequeathed them. I can only hope that young aspiring and novice principals could draw inspiration from the exploits and standards set by the likes of Monkge. There is need to celebrate and exploit, for the benefit of our children, the experience and talents of our homebrewed school principals. In the final analysis, it could be said that absence of professional standards in teaching could partially explain the reason why an effective teaching and learning culture established by one school manager could evaporate and melt away in one single academic year as soon the leader who built it disappears from the scene. It is not uncommon in our jurisdiction to find that a change of guard can overnight change for better or worse the performance trajectory of a school. Clearly the call for a development of teaching and management professional standards accompanied by a comprehensive training of school managers on the different aspects of school management is not without foundation.

The standards will serve as a useful compass for novice and seasoned managers on many critical fronts ranging from deployment of staff, things to consider ensuring effective utilisation of both human and financial resources, help achieve common understanding of what quality instruction looks like and things to consider when drafting what should go into the agenda of meetings. Many meetings, it has been observed, get easily derailed from the core business. Many schools do not accomplish tasks they set out to do not because of shortage of resources but because they cannot utilise optimally the resources at their own disposal. This should not be misconstrued as underestimating the problem of shortage of critical inputs in schools.

Far from it, the issue of resource constraints is a big issue. But the issue here is some schools are able to optimally use the bare minimum resources to achieve more. For instance, it has been observed that schools with the same numbers of computers are sitting at various stages of implementation in so far as the goal of infusion of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) into teaching and learning is concerned. This is because the culture of individual schools and the calibre of its leadership largely determine how well a school utilises resources to raise learning outcomes. In some schools the library has become a white elephant hardly playing any role in teaching and learning.

Another variation in government schools is that some members of management are not under any obligation to participate in the actual teaching and learning. The policy exempts managers from teaching but there is no harm in deploying school managers in the classroom to raise achievement levels. This is what optimal utilisation of human resources is all about!