Understanding School Governing Bodies‟ Perceptions of Quality Education and Underlying Processes: The Case of Chasa Primary School, Nekemte, Ethiopia.

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to explore primary school governors’ perceptions of quality education and their views of key processes that underlie it. Qualitative case study design was employed. Seventeen persons make the population of the study: eight school governing board members and nine parents-teachers association members. Twelve members of the school governing bodies, four core leaders and eight committee members were purposely selected and included. Multiple personal interviews, focus group discussion and document review generated qualitative data. Analysis emphasized on summarizing, re-summarizing, searching for themes and connecting threads. The findings show that the school governing bodies’ understanding of good quality primary education is fairly similar to experts’ definition; Out of the five quality inputs, except school feeding, all the remaining were put in place. However, out five underlying processes, only one key process that is having relevant curriculum and pedagogy was found to be practical. Absences of four crucial underlying processes, making the process incomplete, have negatively affected quality primary education. Out of the five key underlying education quality processes, only one, which is the existence of structured pedagogy and relevant curriculum, was found practiced. Students’ individual and team effort was one of the five key elements of quality singled out as important, which differs from the model. Based on the findings, to make educational process comprehensive, the following recommendations are given to the school’s governing bodies: 1) create a local forum where parents, teachers and interest group discuss about quality education and the processes that might lead towards it; 2) promote adult and non-formal education to build the capacity of parents; 3. Strengthen the link between home, school and community; and 4. install assessment system at grade level that can indicate individual students’ progress.