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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
In Nigeria, education is adopted as an instrument for effective national development. Therefore, all stakeholders in education including communities should participate in the administration of primary schools’ education for comprehensive interaction of persons and ideas at this level of national education.
On the quest for valid and reliable instrument in the assessment of community participation in primary schools’ administration, Akpa (2004) notes that the paucity of measuring instrument in an association such as parents teachers’ association (PTA), old students association, and so on, have restricted the development of community participation in primary schools’ administration. Therefore, all shareholders, of education including communities should participate to the development of education. The state is faced with problems of lack of fund for development, lack of infrastructural facilities, disciplinary problems faced by teachers and community members, and lack of personnel.
Local communities as used in this study include community leaders, age-grades, alumni, parents teachers association – for the purpose of this study, PTA can be used interchangeably with community. These communities collectively or individually at different times have to participate in the administrative functions of the primary schools such as in;
- Funding
- Provision of infrastructural facilities and equipment
- Area of discipline
- Recruitment of personnel
- Decision-making and participation in the development of curriculum.
It is noticed that schools cannot grow outside its communities. Communities engaged in communal relationship with schools in order to see that schools produced citizens who are of high industrious, and are prepared to take up challenges in life.
Schools can, however, be completely helpless in bringing about improvement in the community unless there is a conscious effort to relate the activities of schools to their needs, circumstances, and aspirations of communities. Community schools must integrate and re-elect community life and community living. They must be identified with community needs and community aspirations. Schools must be a true agent of the community. It is to achieve this that one supports the state takeover of schools. This is because under the state system the schools can be controlled and managed by the community as an instrument for the development of the community. With healthy school community relationship, schools can become effective community centers for the mutual improvement of both. Community resources, human and material, can be utilized for the enrichment of school activities, skills and attitudes developed in the schools would be utilized for the development of the communities.
Before the coming of Christian missionaries, different communities and tribes in Nigeria, particularly in Benue State had a way of educating their young ones. This system of education was not practised in a formal school environment with a stipulated curriculum. Each voluntary agency school was responsible for funding, provision of infrastructural facilities, discipline of staff and pupils; recruitment of staff, and so on. But at present these have been taken over by the government. All those schools, which used to be under missionary groups have become government owned with a total number of 2, 238 as public primary schools, and 23,064 number of teachers. (Source: Monitoring and Evaluation Unit, State Universal Basic Education, Makurdi, Benue State, 2005). However, in spite of governments’ involvements, infrastructural facilities remained as they were built by the missionaries which are difficult for Local Government Education Authority (LGEA) or State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) to maintain up to standard.
The Federal Government of Nigeria has placed much emphasis on the role of communities in her policy on the administration of primary schools’ system (Sources: Federal Ministry of Education, NERDC). The day-to-day management should be an off-shoot of the life and social ethics of the community which they serve. Consequently, the administrative machinery for the national education system should be based on the cardinal principles among which are effective lines of communications between local communities and state administrative machinery for policy formulation and implementation.
Assessment is the processes which constitute a very powerful force that can be used to improve the effectiveness of community participation in primary schools’ administration. Assessment also can be a very effective diagnostic device when it comes to finding out about the progress of individual communities. It provides opportunities for exchange of ideas between members of the community and teachers (Stoner, 2004). According to Grant (2002), assessment can be used to reinforce the interpersonal relationships between teachers and pupils. Siann (2004) explains that assessment is the process by which the quality of an individuals work or performance is judged.
In the light of this, assessment can be defined as an opinion or a judgement about something or somebody that has been thought about very carefully; the act of judging or forming an opinion about something or somebody. In defining assessment, World Bank (2002) states that it is a systematic and cyclic process that makes expectations and standards explicit and public.
Assessment of community participation is not a new phenomenon. This has been in existence since men started living together dating back to distant antiquity. It is frequently used to encompass every effort towards the advancement of community interest. Communities in the context of this study, include towns, villages, age grade, parents teachers association, old students association, religious groups, social clubs, local governments and so on in other words, “community” refers to those locations where primary schools are sited and all stakeholders at the community level.
Community participation in this study refers to activities of host communities towards effective facilitation of primary schools’ administration in Benue State. The Nigeria Rural Development Programme advocated strongly for community participation in implementation of development programmes and projects; sharing the benefits of development, decision-making, monitoring and evaluation of development programmes and projects (Akinmade, 2004).
United Nations conceives community participation to connote the process by which efforts of the people themselves are united with those of governments and authorities to improve the economies, social, and cultural conditions of communities into the life of the nation and to enable them to contribute meaningfully to national progress (Kogan, 2001). Sanders (2003) views community participation as the utilization under one single programme of approaches and actions which attempt to combine outside assistance with organized local self-determination and effort, correspondingly seeking to stimulate local initiatives and leadership. Ridgeway (2006) also defines community participation as a method of helping local communities to become aware of their needs, assess their resources in such a way that it satisfies some of their needs and in so doing, acquire attitudes, experiences, and cooperative skills for repeating this process again and again on their own initiatives.
From the foregoing, the common denominator that runs through the various definitions point to the fact that community participation focuses on the betterment of the whole community and the coming together of its people (individuals and groups), to determine their problems via brainstorming and planning, and how to use local initiatives (resources) to solve problems. More so, it stresses that people can initiate, plan and execute projects with technical inputs from government and non-governmental organizations, which are capable of empowering interests in Self-Help-Project.
Consequent upon the above, communities have some tasks to perform in administration and educational matters such as: to cooperate with staff of schools in providing quality education for children based on principles of humanism, patriotism, democracy and on research funding; to advocate for the interests of parents of the children (UNESCO, 2003).
There is an increasing awareness in Benue State on the importance and influence of education as a means of training for good citizenship, as a socializing instrument to integrate the citizen into, and make him or her a useful member of his or her society. In respect of this, former Governor of Benue State, Senator George Akume (2004) points out that education, no doubt, is capital intensive and cannot be borne by governments alone. Successful and effective administration and improvement of primary education system at both public and private settings, therefore, demand for contributions from voluntary agencies, proprietors, communities, Parents’ Teachers’ Associations, etcetera.
