OTHER GENERAL FEATURES OF DECISION MAKING
4.8 WHAT DISCRETION SHOULD BE AVAILABLE?
Once the question of who should be responsible for a decision has been answered, the next question is how much discretion - "room to move" - that person or group should have. We have drawn a distinction between putting limits on:
• the type of decision that may be made; and
• the decision-making process that may be followed.
The reasons for this are explained in the remainder of this section.
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4.8.1 Discretion in the Type of Decision
Should a decision maker's options be restricted at the outset? Should certain types of decision be "ruled out of court" before the process of making a decision even begins?
An example might be that only staff currently employed by the Education Department are eligible to be school principals - a decision to appoint someone from interstate or overseas is simply not possible.
In outlining our general approach to decision making, we have noted that discretion arises from a combination of the "realities" (specific local conditions) and "givens"
(general expectations) of the context within which the decision maker is working. It is the givens which are of particular interest to our discussion here.
Givens may be contained in legislation, a budget, a system-wide policy, a framework of school policies or some other form of instruction. A number of questions arise: how many
"givens" does the system (or a school) need in order to operate; how tightly specified should they be in each of the areas under consideration; and how should they be communicated to people who have to take them into account in their decision making?
Answers to these questions have a strong bearing on the matter of flexibility, something raised specifically in our terms of reference. In considering our answers, we have been aware that there is no simple causal link between rules and behaviour. Decision makers working with the same set of givens make different decisions. The flexibility may be there but it is not taken up. This is due not only to actual differences in local circumstances but also to differences in perception and belief about the amount of discretion available.
Flexibility can only be fully understood in terms of the way people respond to the latitude available to them. There are many factors at work here.
For example, some principals seem naturally to be risk-takers, while others are conservative. The givens themselves may be ambiguous or contradictory (principals cite the case of the guidelines for the school accountability policy containing the word
"must" in several places, even though the official status of guidelines is "non- mandatory"). A further complication is that apart from the official documented givens, teachers and principals are aware of the unwritten rules (which may be at odds with official policies) about acceptable risks and standards of acceptable performance.
Currently, decision making in government schools is highly regulated. Historically, regulation by the central office has been regarded as the main way of assuring a quality education for all children. Over the years many new rules have been added to the legislative framework with which the system began. The current regulatory framework comprises 544 "operational directives" (not including Departmental and Secondary Education Authority syllabus statements and related curriculum materials), with a further 36 currently "under development"2. There are several thousand pages of "micro- controls" with which a school's administration ideally needs to be familiars.
These micro-controls include:
• legislation (e.g. the Education Act and Regulations);
• departmental policy (e.g. School Development Plans: Policy...);
• non-mandatory guidelines associated with policies (e.g. School Accountability: ...
Guidelines);
• formal industrial agreements binding the Education Department and the State School Teachers' Union (e.g. Memorandum of Agreement 1991);
• stand-alone Administrative Instructions (e.g. Long Service Leave 1994); and
• non-binding "friendly advice" (e.g. Use of Envelopes).
Each is a statement of what people must, should or might do in some area of responsibility. Each indicates an amount of discretion and, in some cases, the sanctions that apply if the person responsible does not adhere to the limits. In total, they constitute the system's accumulated regulatory wisdom. It is a pervasive body of law as well as of lore.
The current regulatory framework is already inconsistent with the organisational reforms of the past seven years, and is out of touch with the general directions implied by our terms of reference. The overall framework is vague about student learning (expected outcomes and standards), though prescriptive - through micro-controls which severely limit discretion - about how schools and the work of teachers are to be organised. A good deal of regulatory constraint for schools now emerges from "non-educational"
legislation and ordinances in the areas of finance, occupational health and safety, industrial relations, equal opportunity and so forth.
We agree with others before us that there is a urgent need to do something about this situation. The National Industry Education Forum, for example, has called for a "new framework of law ... which decentralises authority and which locates operational responsibility at the point where it can be most effectively exercised" (1992:8). The report of last year's Review of Education and Training noted that "the Review Committee considers that urgent priority should be given to completion of the new Education Act"
(Vickery, 1993:28). Both were silent, however, on the form of the new regulatory framework and the means by which it should be devised. More recently, the Western Australian Minister for Education established the Education Act Review Project, which is due to produce a draft bill for public consultation in 1995. Our recommendations will have direct implications for the way decision making is currently regulated in classrooms, schools and the central office. In formulating these recommendations, both the form of regulation and the means by which it could be established and managed have been considered.
It has been impossible for us to document the complex systems of written givens and unwritten norms and to pinpoint discrepancies among them. In any case, such an analysis would have been insufficient if it assumed a simple causal link between rules and behaviour. Often, people use rules rather than follow them: they make their decisions and refer selectively to rules only when challenged to justify what has already been decided. From this perspective, givens are something that teachers and principals use in conjunction with their other knowledge to get on with their jobs as they see fit.
Hence our recommendations have had to be prepared with an eye to the dynamics of school life in which people respond to changes in regulation. In the same way that a
"good idea" can be misunderstood, lost or altered as it travels from central office to a child in a classroom (if indeed a "good idea" can be successful via this route), so, too, a reform based on "good new regulations" could fail if the new rules are progressively interpreted and reinterpreted in ways not anticipated or intended by those who have framed them.
Our base position on this issue is that decisions will almost invariably need to be made within defined limits in order to ensure equity and a high standard of provision for all children. The general criteria we have referred to when defining limits are that they should:
• be clearly stated and provide for the maximum discretion consistent with equitable, effective and efficient use of available resources;
• maximise an opportunity for people to exercise the expertise that everyone at their level can be expected to have. For example, it is expected that:
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— class teachers have expertise in planning lessons, pedagogy and classroom management; and
— principals have additional expertise in leadership, staff management, school planning and supervision.
• recognise the realities of the context and the capabilities of people.
4.8.2 Discretion in How Decisions are Made
The issue here is how much discretion there should be in the way decisions are made - what limits should there be on decision-making processes?
An example is planning for school improvement. Few, if any, would disagree that principals and teachers must make planning decisions. There is similar agreement that the types of planning decisions made must reflect the availability of financial and other resources, and current and aimed-for levels of student achievement. But opinions diverge on the extent to which the planning process itself should be mandated. Should there be a "formula" for school planning which all must follow?
There is also the question of whether the responsible decision maker/s should be required to involve (and how) other people in the decision-making process.
Should the decision maker be required to adopt democratic, consultative, or participative group decision making approaches? Should there be rules for involving stakeholders?
The issue of procedural discretion is important because there are implications for the amount of time needed to make decisions; the ethos of classrooms and schools; and the extent to which people will feel committed, because of their involvement in the process, to the implementation of decisions once taken. There are claims to consider to the effect that certain types of decision-making processes lead to better-quality decisions than others. In particular, the claim that group decision making is superior to individual decision making, has to be considered, and balanced against any calls on teachers' time to participate in collaborative decision making. There is also the need to consider claims that mandatory checks and balances in decision-making processes play a very important role in ensuring accountability. Finally, there is the matter of the extent to which decision-making processes should include avenues for appeal or ratification before a decision can be implemented.
Our base position is that decision-making processes should not be regulated unless there are good reasons - related to the probable consequences of there being no regulation - to do so. Such reasons, in most cases, have been found through consideration of the following statements:
• The class teacher is the main school person influencing children's achievement - if class teachers are making sound decisions and implementing them well, students are likely to be achieving reasonable outcomes.
• Strong educational leadership, particularly from school principals, is confirmed by the findings of studies of school effectiveness. Constraints on school leadership restrict its capacity to marshal the talents of the staff and community to the best effect.
• When school culture and climate are positive and supportive, a school is well on the way to being a "good school". Each school should have freedom to build, sustain and shape its culture and climate so that staff and students feel they "belong" in a place where there are common goals and a shared vision.
• Children's learning benefits from parental interest and involvement in that learning.
• A feeling of "ownership" develops when schools make their own decisions and this can lead to a strong commitment to see decisions implemented well.
• Professionalism includes the enjoyment of a good deal of responsibility in the conduct of one's work and inbuilt mechanisms to ensure that standards are upheld. Greater autonomy for principals and teachers will bring greater scope for professional judgement. We would want to see teachers and principals respond to this by recognising that this may require a review of the current mechanisms through which professional standards are upheld.
• Teaching can be a solitary activity even in schools with a strong positive culture and climate. But most teachers instinctively recognise the potential of teamwork to improve their own performance and that of their school. This potential can be realised where there are real problems to be solved, important decisions to be made, and there is a team leader - the principal - who is prepared to provide the opportunities for teams to develop and flourish.