Poverty proved to be a serious challenge to the success of the IP intervention in the most disadvantaged schools. All principals, teachers and members of school governing bodies in the schools where I did my research.
Letter to the Eastern Cape Department of Education APPENDIX 2 Letter from Eastern Cape Department f Education
Interview Schedule for Non-key Teachers APPENDIX 9 Interview Schedule for SGB Members
School Role Players Interviewed
MEC Member of the Executive Committee (cabinet minister in the provincial parliaments in South Africa). In 1979, there was a lengthy strike at my school, which resulted in the departure of the principal midway through the year.
UNDERSTANDING EDUCATIONAL CHANGE
- The nature of educational Change
- The need for change in the principal’s management role
- Factors influencing change in management practices of principals
One of the changes in directorship, according to Sybouts and Wendel (1994: 2), is the range of expectations of the position. What educational and contextual factors have influenced the change in school principals' management practices in the context of the IP?
TRANSFORMATION IN SOUTH AFRICAN EDUCATION: PROMISE, POLICY AND PROBLEMS
- Education in South Africa before 1994
- School-based management in South Africa
Institutional management within the school system was one of the weakest and least coherent aspects of education in South Africa. One of the core principles of the IP is a move away from centralizing power in the central office towards school-based management.
THE EASTERN CAPE: POVERTY AND EDUCATION
It is therefore not surprising that the Eastern Cape has been identified as the poorest province in the whole of South Africa. This is disempowering for such parents and prevents them from playing a meaningful role in the management of the school.
THE IMBEWU PROJECT
The areas in which the school role players were trained appear in the Imbewu training program conceptual framework as modules as discussed below. In IP, the school cluster is the smallest unit for cooperation between schools, networks and mutual support.
CONCLUSION
The chapter also reflects on the potential challenges of school-based management in disadvantaged Eastern Cape schools. I will continue by examining theories of school improvement, school-based management, and the role of the principal.
APPROACHES TO SCHOOL CHANGE
- The school effectiveness approach to school change
- The school improvement approach to school change
- Restructuring
- Reculturing
One of the issues with school improvement initiatives such as IP is the institutionalization and sustainability of the changes introduced. This section examines restructuring, which Fink and Stoll (1998) consider one of the concerns of school improvement.
EDUCATIONAL CHANGE AND SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT
- The changing nature of educational change and school improvement initiatives
- Approaches to School Improvement
- The Research and Development Approaches
- The School-based Approach to School Improvement
- Challenges of School-based approaches
Below is a discussion of the four phases of educational change that have been identified by key figures in school change. These problems affect the functioning of the school and ultimately the principal's performance. Another major challenge with the school improvement initiatives is the many levels at which the school improvement/change process works.
CONTEXTUAL FACTORS AND EDUCATIONAL CHANGE
Adam and Waghid (2005) identify socio-economic factors in South Africa as some of the factors that hinder democratic practices in school in terms of SGB participation in disadvantaged communities. Stoll and Fink suggest that the best chance to change schools in ways that prepare students for the challenges of the twentieth century is to view schools and their contexts as ecosystems. Therefore, awareness of the existence of variables in the context within which the intervention is implemented should be an integral part of the analysis of changes in schools.
THE ROLE AND IMPORTANCE OF THE PRINCIPAL TO PROCESSES OF SCHOOL CHANGE AND SCHOOL
- The management and leadership role of the school principal
- The School Principal’s Role of Leadership
- School-based Management and Changes in Functions and Roles
The following section discusses the role of the principal in the professional development of teachers and briefly the role of the school management team (SMT). This section deals with the principal's relationship with the immediate school community. Most of the information from the governance and management department comes to the school through the principal.
FACTORS THAT DETERMINE SUSTAINABILITY AND INSTITUTIONALISATION OF CHANGES IN SCHOOLS
- Changing the culture of the school
- District support and pressure
- Local ownership by the school
The next section will discuss the factors that are thought to help ensure sustainability of the activities of interventions such as the IP. Hopkins, et al also note that the ultimate achievement of improvement is a transformation of the culture of the school. After all, they are products of the schools they must support, and the system they must change.
CONCLUSION
Institutionalization and sustainability of changes in schools resulting from interventions such as IP was identified as one of the challenges in developing countries such as South Africa. The challenges of changing roles in school management in relation to SASA were noted. This conclusion is that the two must be in balance and complement each other in the person of the principal.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 3.1 INTRODUCTION
RESEARCH DESIGN
- Quantitative research
- Qualitative research
The examination of participants' views assumes a similarity between the views of the principals and those of the teachers and SGB members in a particular school regarding their experiences with management changes in the school. To achieve this, as Babbie and Mouton (2001) suggest, research must focus on the views and interpretations of participants. This was one of the limitations of this study, which will be discussed in section 3.7.
POPULATION AND SAMPLING
- Population
- Sampling procedures for the questionnaires
- Sampling for the interviews
In this study, the sample was ten percent (10%) of the participating SGBs, teachers and principals, as the population consisted of more than 500 persons. The type of sampling for the sample schools was determined by the delivery or implementation structure of the IP. As mentioned in section 3.1, in the second phase of the study I conducted interviews with the role players.
Principal 2 Principal 3 Principal 4 Principal 5 Type of
SOURCES OF DATA
- The questionnaire
- The questionnaire design
- Piloting the questionnaires
- Administration of the questionnaires
- Interviews
- The design of the interview guide
- Gaining access for interviews
- The Interviewing process
- Reliability of the interviews
- DOCUMENTS
The formulation of the specific questions in the questionnaire is based on the research questions. As mentioned in section 3.2, the second phase of the research consisted of conducting interviews with the school's role players. For all schools except one (school no. 3), the interviews were conducted at the home of the SGB members.
DATA PROCESSING AND ANALYSIS
- Analysis of data from questionnaires
- Processing and analysis of data from interviews and documents
This involved looking for ways in which what was in the documents agreed or did not agree with what the principal had said about his or her activities. The first step in the analysis was to carefully read and re-read the transcripts looking for patterns, themes and ideas that described the changes in school leadership experienced by the participants, the factors that led to success or lack of impact of Imbewu and the factors that that were seen as possible causes or limits to the institutionalization and durability of the changes experienced. Most of the categories corresponded to the headings and subheadings of the literature review and would be used as such in the data analysis chapter.
ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS
- Informed Consent
- Confidentiality and Anonymity
- The issues of trustworthiness, soundness and authenticity
This helps participants make informed decisions before agreeing to participate in the study and provide information (McMillan & Schumacher, 2001). I also presented a letter from the ECDE to the director granting me permission to conduct the research in the schools. The letter was intended to convince the director, SGB members and teachers to participate in the research activities.
CONCLUSION
Unlike quantitative research where issues of validity and reliability are addressed under clear topics of validity and reliability, in qualitative research there is no consensus on such topics (Konyana, 2001). While qualitative researchers began using the traditional concepts of validity and reliability, they have recently developed their own language using concepts such as reliability, robustness, and authenticity to justify the interpretation and conclusions of the research (Konyana, 2001).
PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF QUANTITATIVE DATA
INTRODUCTION
Nevertheless, the impact of the IP influences stakeholders' views and stakeholders' views will have influenced the success of the IP. I then discuss the views of the participants about the IP training and how its nature and duration may have influenced IP implementation. Finally, I discuss the contextual and educational factors that could have had an impact on the implementation of the IP.
PROFILES OF RESPONDENTS
- Profiles of Principals
It would be expected that the fact that the majority of directors were women would influence the implementation of IP. It is therefore expected that they will have a large positive impact on supporting their teachers during IP implementation. With this background, it is unclear whether the teaching experience that the principals would bring to the teaching and learning situation during IP implementation would be very useful and important for transformation.
Most junior male principals, like their female counterparts below, would still have many years of service left, so IP funds spent on them would be very beneficial for education in the years to come. This is evident from the decision of the Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Education in the Republic of Transkei, which submitted its findings to the then Government of Transkei in November 1979. The commission made the following recommendation in relation to primary schools: "the inclusion of more female teachers on the lists for promotion to principals and vice-principals of primary schools ".
This was in line with the correction of gender discrimination that prevailed at the time in most walks of life in the EC and in SA as a whole, where it was easy for a male teacher to be promoted with less demands than his female counterpart. The rationale for this recommendation was prompted by the identified need to reverse the prevailing discrimination against women in relation to promotion. This decision shows that bantustans were not always just resorts for the unemployed; but it occasionally gave local governments a chance to make independent decisions and produce policies that were ahead of their time.
While 51% of female principals had work experience of 20 years or more, only 18.2% of male principals were in this category.
Profile of Teachers
This would affect both the implementation of the IP and the sustainability of the changes introduced. This means that the quality of the students admitted to the colleges was generally not high. Most of the teachers in the primary schools who had the responsibility to implement the IP belonged to this group of teachers from the colleges of education.
Profiles of members of school governing bodies
The fact that all the SGB members in this sample were men may indicate that most chairpersons of the SGBs were men. The fact that most of the respondents were chairmen or their deputies was guided by the design of the IP. However, some had served as members of the school committees mentioned in chapter 1.
PARTICIPANTS’ VIEWS ON THE IMBEWU PROJECT
- The Participants' involvement in the IP Training Programme
- The most beneficial aspects of the Imbewu Training
- Reasons why some aspects of training were regarded as beneficial
- Principals and teachers’ views on the changes in the management practices of their schools
- Developing systems, processes and support structures for teachers’
- Views on changes in financial management practices
Therefore, we cannot assume that the relationship between parents (SGBs) and principals and teachers would have been harmonious during the process of IE implementation. It brought parents to the school and encouraged parental involvement in the affairs of the school. Collaboration also supported the principle of clustering of schools used in the implementation of the IP.
