Managing education to yield good results

Dr Femi AkinwumiDr. Femi Akinwumi of the Department of Education Management, University of Ibadan, has expressed concern about how education at all levels has been handled in the country. Also, Dr. Adebola Jaiyeoba of the same department highlighted qualities education standard in the country. Excerpts:

QUALITY IN EDUCATION
quality can be defined as “the degree of excellence” a thing possesses. quality is also considered in terms of accuracy and timeliness.

In education, quality can be described as the long-term commitment and continuous improvement of learning with the active participation of all (both teaching and non-teaching) to meet and exceed parent’s or guardian’s expectation.

In other words, quality means effective management. Quality is what many parents are looking for and this is why most of them take their children to private schools.

Quality is a relative word and is usually measured by cost. Every school needs to strive for quality.

FACTORS THAT AFFECT QUALITY DELIVERY IN THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM
Quality in education depends upon a number of factors:
Quality Environment: There must be high hygiene standard, clean environment i.e. smell free. There should be a proper maintenance of the school environment. The classrooms should be conducive to learning. The playground must be properly maintained, grasses cut and flowers trimmed. All the school facilities must be so designed and arranged as to suit the school objectives, the objectives of the students and staff in the objectives of the school programme schedules. In short, the environment must be spacious and attractive.

Quality Personnel: It is a known fact that schools must have teaching and non-teaching personnel. The question that arises is, what qualities do the personnel employed possess? The educational administrator by virtue of his position either in the ministry or in a privately owned school must equip the school with good and qualified teachers. The process of doing this include interviews, test, recruitment, job analysis and keeping records. The administrator should not make do with just anybody. There must be training and development of staff. The training must aim at improving staff competencies and productivity including on the job training, workshops, in-service, etc. the school administrator should ensure that good personnel policies are formulated and implemented appropriately in the school. The staff must also be motivated. This will make it easy to engineer the staff to be highly devoted to achieve the objectives of the school, education, and the students.

Quality Resources: The administrator must ensure that quality resources are available in the school. Quality stock must be purchased instead of cheap ones. The laboratory, liberty and health clinic must be well equipped and standardised. The pupils to be admitted must go through test or examination to ensure that only those that are qualified are admitted. This is important because the quality of the input will determine the quality of output if every other thing is in place. There must be a responsibility by the staff for equipment, material, etc. Apart from this, building up or replacement policy on the part of the staff is essential.

Quality of Output: In a manufacturing company, the quality of the output determines customer’s response to the goods being prod uced. In educational system, the quality of the output (students) is a function of how parents or guardian will patronise such schools. The administrator must ensure that everything is done to produce the best. The staff must be punctual, diligent, relentless in teaching and discipline on the children and the staff also must be disciplined when it is necessary. There must also be an improvement of instruction.

The curricular content must meet the requirement of external agencies such as WAEC, NECO, NBTE, etc. Consequently, the modern educational administrator is expected to emphasise the development of learning activities, encourage teachers and students to take responsibility for their teaching and learning, develop processes for continuous assessment of students’ progress and organize remedial programmes for the needy students. When customers (parents) are satisfied with the quality of any school output, the tendency is for them to fall over one another for their children to get admitted to such schools.

QUALITY CONTROL PROCESS
The issue of quality control in education is concerned with the measurement and judgement of the processes and outcomes of particular educational activities. The purpose is to maintain the existing practice and if there is need, a change can be instructed. Therefore quality control in education has the promise that a good education can be made better. The following will guide the administrator in quality control in educational system.

Collection of Data: Data collection assists the school administrator to know whether there is growth, improvement, effectiveness and success in any aspect of the school programme. The data can be on population, performance, finance record, etc. For instance, data collection will show reduction or increase in population, those who passed and those who failed, the amount collected by the school and comparison could be made weekly, termly and yearly. The data will show the area of deviation and why. When this is done, it will be obvious to the administrator, whether there is progress or otherwise.

Evaluation: Evaluation includes taking inventory of all phases of the educational programme. We can say that there are three aspects of school evaluation.

Student evaluation: Student evaluation in Nigeria is centered on entrance and final or graduation examinations. Administrators are therefore advised to ensure continuous assessment of the students. Continuous assessment should enhance both the formative and summative evaluation. The continuous assessment could be weekly, forthnightly, monthly, termly and yearly. The administrator should de-emphasise automatic promotion to enhance quality in the final output and create selective condition that obliterates the concept of equal opportunities for all and imply a false motion of excellence.

Teacher evaluation: Many evaluators tend to measure teacher competency in terms of the number of students that pass the teacher’s subject at the end of a course. Teacher evaluations should include teachers’ ability in his subject area, his classroom management, motivation of students, recognizing and providing for the individual abilities of true student, resourcefulness in the use of materials, relationship with his contemporary and his professional union, ability to plan, clarity of expression, enthusiasm, patience, enjoyment of teaching, instance on high standard, etc. The involvement of students in teacher evaluation should be encouraged, because generally the student knows what he expects of a teacher to make him/her learn. In a study of student preference of teacher qualities in Nigeria Secondary schools, reported that the student preferred the following qualities in order of importance: mastery of his subjects, interest and involvement in school social activities, good relationship with students, etc. While specific teacher personality factors such as age, sex, appearance, etc.

School programme evaluation: The primary function of the administrator as within-the-school supervisor is to find out what is to be taught. This is more so because most of the programmes operated in the schools were determined by the following.
School records management.

The complexity of school administration occasioned by students population explosion makes it imperative for school administrators to be exposed to ways and means of making their job less arduous. One way to do this, is to be able to keep records properly.

Records are collected and stored by different people for different purposes. The gate man in some schools have the visitor’s book, which could include the time-in and time-out.

The storekeeper has an inventory of items in and out of store i.e. who collects what? What is left and what needs to be replenished?
The school like any other organisation has its own set of records, which are kept, for its efficient administration. The class teacher has his own records, the subject teacher has his, the heads of departments have theirs, vice principal administration and academic have theirs etc. Head teacher must have access to the records.

The use of documents in school administration has increased as a result of increases in student population. Parents and all concerned with education industry nowadays tend to be more serious with a school, whether obtained through training and re-training exercise. This will improve the technical skill of the school administrator to use his knowledge of administrative methods, techniques and procedures to foster and enhance discipline in his school.

Engagement of Dedicated Teacher: Only dedicated teachers can be committed to the application of school rules and regulations. Such teachers bring a desired level of professionalism into teaching by ensuring that student comply with the rules and ensure that culprits are punished.

Leadership by Example: Discipline in School System can easily be promoted when Head teacher and other staff lead by example. As Fafunwa (1977:52) rightly puts it, the school head and his teaching and non-teaching staff must be self-disciplined or be prepared for the inevitability of losing the right to discipline others.

School Rules and Regulations: The creation of conductive teaching and learning situations can be achieved by making enforceable rules and regulations. The rules and regulations must not be too harsh. They must be enforceable and agreed upon by the entire members of the school. i.e. principal, staff and students.
Student Welfare: Adequate attention must be placed on the welfare of the students in order for the School Management to be able to implement her rules and regulations. The school authority should embark on frequently dialogue and meetings with the students.

Establishment of a P.T.A.: The Parent-Teacher Association (P.T.A.) is another means by which a Head-teacher can establish good discipline in the school system. The P.T.A. can be made to discuss issues related to disciplinary matters during P.T.A. meetings.

Teaching of Moral and Religious Studies: The teaching of moral and religious studies will go a long way in instilling the fear of God in the minds of the students. This will draw the students closer to God and make them obedient than before.

Guidance and Counselling Services: The availability of effective guidance and counseling services in the school will promote discipline by helping students particularly the maladjusted students in the area of emotional, personal and social adjustment.

Conducive Learning Facilities: The provision of learning facilities make the students to enjoy learning and put away their minds from disobedience thereby making disciple in attainable in the school system.