Based on the narratives presented above, I now present an analysis locat- ing the events in literature and theory.
School Resources Learning resources are a major factor and have consis- tently been associated with high achievement in schools, without which pupils’ academic performance is affected, leading to a decreased interest in education and eventual dropouts (Abagi and Odipo 1997). From the narratives told, it emerges that the unavailability of resources is a major factor contributing to non-performance in rural schools. Principals clearly establish that educational resources are important ingredients for academic achievement in their schools (Zuze 2008). They endeavour to make resources available to support infrastructure and basic meals for their teachers and pupils, using FPE and other supplementary funds.
Though schools receive funding and try to supplement their income through mobilising resources and other income generation activities, it is not enough. Inadequate facilities and learning materials are major and direct problems confronting these rural, flood-prone schools. Strong evi- dence points to an impoverished society with widespread poverty, largely attributed to rurality.
Teacher Methodology and Motivation Teachers’ attitudes towards their work and to pupils, classroom management and their interaction with pupils have a great impact on academic achievement (Abagi and Odipo 1997). The narratives refer to ‘school-driven teacher motivation’ and internal teacher motivation, which comes from within the teacher, who is orientated towards job satisfaction. Principals have incentives in place—both monetary and non-monetary—to motivate teachers. The biggest challenge with this has been that principals tend to work on their own to find resources to motivate teachers. Parents, occasionally supple-
mented by the school BoM, are burdened to financially support incen- tives related to teachers’ increased workloads. It is evident that schools endeavour to provide incentives like meals and rewards that eventually become unsustainable due to inadequate funds.
Instructional Leadership In an effective school, the principal acts as an instructional leader and effectively and persistently communicates that mission to the staff, parents, and students (Lezotte 1999). Principals in the schools under study understand and apply this practice to promote instructional effectiveness. Their schools have the instructional pro- gramme through the principal as the instructional leader. Through this practice, principals in the five schools understand and embrace this spirit to build the capacity and confidence of their teachers towards their schools. Throughout the narratives, principals in the five schools are gen- erally happy with the status quo. The school climate seems to be just fine in most schools, as every teacher gets a chance to lead in respective areas.
Principals rotate responsibility amongst their teachers to build their capacity in different departments, which is positive. However, all the sto- ries told reveal a lack of adequate/trained human resources in the school which often compromises learning.
Parental Involvement In the effective school, parents understand and support the school’s basic mission, and are given the opportunity to play an important role in helping the school to achieve this mission (Lezotte 1999). There is evidence that aspects of family involvement in education do help more students succeed. In fact, parental involvement (Epstein 2005) has short- and long-term benefits during and after, early childhood education programmes. Principals generally embrace parental involve- ment in school work, but it appears that parents do not prioritise this. Of interest is that most parents understand the importance of parental involvement at school and are willing to participate, but do not. Some participate at school, but the participation is not academically related.
Rather, these parents dedicate their time to school farming and other activities with which they are both familiar and comfortable. These par- ents volunteer to do this work, but cannot attend a single meeting with teachers on their children’s progress at the same school. Some parents get
involved in other school activities (e.g. farming) partly because it is pres- tigious to be associated with the principal. The participation is just to be in the ‘good books’ of the school administration. However, I get the sense that perhaps schools do not know how to deal with parental involvement in school matters effectively, let alone increased levels of parental partici- pation. Being a rural setting, most parents are too illiterate to participate in anything academic for their children and therefore prefer to stay away.
Others are too preoccupied with family commitments to attend any school matters and, therefore, do not prioritise school activities. When aggressive strategies are used on parents to attend progress meetings of their children, they comply. Of interest is the fact that parents get more interested in participating in school activities of their children in the can- didate class. They provide support like meals and learning material, and also attend meetings as required, probably to support their children to excel. This is an area that requires further attention, perhaps more encour- agement on school-family collaboration in rural schools.
School Communities, Community Culture and Environment
School Communities The principals’ experiences show that school com- munities are an integral part of promoting learning. As emphasised, school communities, families and communities share (Laosa 2005) major responsibilities for children. When working collaboratively, they can play important roles in fostering cross-cultural understanding and intergroup cooperation. I closely link school communities to culture, the commu- nity, the environment, and the school, as schools tend to mirror the cul- ture and environment they are in. There is convergence from principals on the positive perception of school communities towards schools’ strate- gies and their support towards promoting learning. This support is closely linked to positive aspects of the community culture and the environ- ment. Principals acknowledged the out-of-school disciplinary role par- ents, the community and the local government play, as well as practical and cultural solutions they offer to particular problems. However, posi- tive school community strategies and perceptions are impeded by some
cultural practices in the locality. According to Abagi and Odipo (1997), culture and beliefs that develop into sociocultural factors, such as initia- tion ceremonies and gender socialisation, are some of the cultural factors responsible for pupils’ failure to complete primary school education, as explained below.
Culture Less useful cultures (e.g. disco matanga), along with gender ste- reotypes, associated with immoral behaviour, should be eradicated in this locality even if it calls for aggressive strategies. Related to culture and beliefs is the issue of child labour. In Budalang’i, the community’s mea- sure of success lies in the socioeconomic activities: farming and fishing.
The community and parental influence are evident, where parents ask their children to take care of crops on rice farms or to go fishing to sup- plement food for the family, often resulting in absenteeism and poor per- formance. There are also cases of pupils, particularly boys, going fishing to obtain money during and after flooding. This is usually to provide for the family or to supplement food at home. At times, boys just want to take advantage of floods to make some money from fish sales, which proves to be detrimental because they eventually get disinterested in school after obtaining the proceeds from the fish. Girls, on the other hand, stay away from school to help with household chores. The com- munity also deals with cases where mothers abandon their children to get married elsewhere, which, to an extent, affects their children’s learning.
In general, socioeconomic causal linkages in this community have led to a high rate of school dropouts and the spread of HIV/AIDS, leaving the community socially, economically and educationally impoverished. I acknowledge that cultural beliefs may, at times, supersede school, but only if they are useful. Less useful cultures that may stifle learning need to be eradicated as principals strive to achieve learning.
Community/Environment Generally, this community embraces the importance of education. Firstly, regarding gender, there was no signifi- cant variance in gender enrolment, which is a positive aspect. In the five schools under study, participation stood at 49.2% male and 50.8%
female, conforming to enrolment documents in the schools. However, getting into a deeper understanding, the community seemed to maintain
the superiority aspect of boys over girls. Educational opportunities for girls may have increased, perhaps because of the FPE and not due to a change of cultural norms and practices. Either way, an opportunity for the education of the girl child is a great leap forward towards promoting learning. Though more girls drop out in the course of learning, due to gender stereotypes and other reasons, boys also interact with some other challenges that distract them from learning.
Conclusion
Reflecting on the unfolding events, it is evident that rural circumstances create challenges for rural school principals. Principals as school leaders are supposed to provide strategic direction in the school system. However, the rural context creates additional and unique challenges that markedly differentiate their leadership from that of their counterparts in urban areas. There is a correlation between effective principal leadership and learning achievement. Rural school leaders are burdened with responsi- bility e.g. increasing accountability for learner achievement as well as management responsibilities. To this end, rural schools remain more dis- advantaged with distinct challenges compared to urban schools. The leadership practices and challenges of rural school principals require rural-specific strategies. The provision of school resources and teacher motivation are necessary intervening variables to achieve learning. This should be coupled with adequate teaching and learning resources, well- qualified teachers together with adequate funding towards achieving school effectiveness and improvement.
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A. Masinire, A. P. Ndofirepi (eds.), Rurality, Social Justice and Education in Sub-Saharan Africa Volume I, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-57277-8_8