ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of BOM governance practices on completion of school projects in public secondary schools in Rachuonyo North Sub County in Kenya. The study was guided by the following objectives as the research objectives; BOMs’ project planning, resource mobilization by BOM, BOMs’ stakeholder involvement and project supervision by BOM in public secondary schools in Rachuonyo North Sub County in Kenya. The study was guided by stakeholder theory propounded by Freeman (1984). The study adopted descriptive research design. The study targeted principals, teachers, and BOM’s, in public secondary schools in Rachuonyo North Sub County in Kenya. The sample size constituted of constituted of 21 principals, 21 BOM chairpersons, 1 SCDOE and 105 teachers. Data collection tools were questionnaires and an interview guide. Instrument validity was assured through seeking expert opinion of university supervisors. Instrument reliability was determined through test-retest method. Descriptive and inferential statistics that included correlation and regression were used for analysis of quantitative and qualitative data which included mean and standard deviation, results presented in frequencies and percentages. Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 23.0 was used for data analysis. Key findings of the study were; Based on the first objective of the study, which was to investigate the influence of BOMs’ project planning on completion of school projects. It was found to be statistically significant by principals (M=3.91, r=0.981, r2=0.962; p<0.05), BOM (M=3.55, r=0.989,
r2=0.978; p>0.05) and teachers (M=3.45, r=0.98, r2=0.96; p<0.05).Based on the second objective of the study, which was to investigate the influence of Resource Mobilization by BOM on Completion of School Projects. It was found to be statistically significant by principals (M=3.72, r=0.973, r2=0.947; p<0.05), BOM (M=3.89, r=0.981, r2=0.962; p>0.05) and teachers (M=3.52, r=0.576, r2=0.355;
p<0.05). Based on the second objective of the study, which was to investigate the influence of BOMs’ Stakeholder Involvement on Completion of School Projects. It was found to be statistically significant by principals (M=3.61, r=0.980, r2=0.961; p<0.05), BOM (M=2.80, r=0.894, r2=0.800; p>0.05) and teachers (M=3.62, r=0.980,
r2=0.961; p<0.05).Based on the second objective of the study, which was to investigate the influence of Project Supervision by BOM on Completion of School Projects in Public. It was found to be statistically significant by principals (M=3.77, r=0.987, r2=0.975; p<0.05), BOM (M=3.75, r=0.961, r2=0.924; p>0.05) and teachers
(M=2.51, r=0.644, r2=0.441; p<0.05).This study concludes that funds for completion of projects in secondary schools were insufficient and unreliable. Completion of the projects is also compromised by the poor relations between various stakeholders due to personal interests and allowing negative politics to interfere with equitable distribution of available resources among schools. The study recommends that, the Ministry of Education should ensure that school leadership, through relevant tailor- made courses, is constantly equipped with the necessary knowledge on financial management and accountability. The government should encourage the school management to aim at diversifying their sources of funds by engaging in income generating activities. This will minimize the schools dependency on government funds alone thus ensuring successful completion of school projects.
CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
Background to the Study
Worldwide education remains a tool of growth economically since it drives and enables availability of human skill to an economy of a nation. This is why different governments have committed themselves to Education for All (EFA) as per the deliberations of the year 1990 in Jomtein Thailand and the year 2000 in Dakar Senegal. Secondary school education in the United States of America (USA) was a result of collaborative efforts between the government and the church who had adopted it in their ministry (Ellen, 2009). The state and the church pooled resources together for developing physical facilities as well as staff salaries. The year 1965 saw the formation of ESEA (Elementary and secondary education) act, which was later reinforced by the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act; that became the fundamental federal statute impacting the kindergarten education up to the 12th grade in USA. All this developments engaged key players from the state,church and parents associations.
Involvement of every player in the education field is critical for the development of learning institutions; with this aiding in determining the plans applicable in improving the educational standards. According to (Green & Haines, 2008), involvement is viewed as formative, instructive, and unifying and a way of promoting human rights. In the USA, school initiatives completion demands the implementation of set plans that transform monetary, labor and manmade utilities into commodities adding great
value to learners, learning institutions and every player in the education sector (Cleland 2010).
Within the European nations, the education sector provides a number of edges for conducting initiatives benefitting learners and learning institutions. Almost all school initiatives, save for a few undergo the project planning cycle during development; with the cycle for small to bigger initiatives commonly following the inception, viability, assessment, legalization, execution, completion, operation and termination cycle. During determination, a single initiative among many is preferred and later profiled. (Fenton-O’Creevy, 2000), indicated that viability studies entail analysis for technical, market and monetary productivity, technical reviews and business evaluation strategies are created.
In Britain, school boards have a great contribution in the running of learning institutions; in a letter from Britain to schools in Europe, the school boards indicated the impartial nature of cost sharing systems, placing a biased burden on a number of member countries abusing Article 12.4 of the European Schools Convention, necessitating the need for important educational amendments. This is an illustration indicating the leadership of school boards in overseeing the funds in these institutions (UK Delegation, 2013).
During the early days the responsibility of BOM was largely limited to management, including supervision and guidance. Later in the 19th century, amendments were done in the structural organization of school boards, the administration of education at the community level was transferred to well specialized entities (Bhagat & Black, 2002). The purpose of these amendments was to duplicate the running of school boards as
those of business companies’ boards, to realign the concentration of school boards to
the concerns of the immediate society and enhance their leadership responsibility. Presently the evolving context for public learning demands a reform in responsibilities from management to leadership, aimed at providing a sense of course for future.
In Massachusetts, Boston (USA) select men decided to select a community board dealing with education so as to alienate governance from existing municipal roles (Danzberger, 1998). This model of school management was later embraced across USA and continues to be the anchor for educational management processes today.
Chikati (2009) observed that in Russia, learning institutions are modeled, strategized and executed mutually with the structure of project cycle aimed at increasing completion pace that greatly relies on project supervision. The log frame matrix model is strictly adhered to and applied specifically as a tool in designing, evaluating, managing, monitoring and assessing the progress of an initiative through the initiative cycle from strategy structure to assessment and lastly termination. The model preferred offers` the goal-specific processes and similar presumptions and the set state of the initiative model of another management level matrix format initiatives often are initiated in the manner of a unstable, uncertain and vigorous surroundings. Many school projects therefore in Russia, have been able to reduce challenges, constraints and risks in the course of their execution through completion.
Learning institutions initiatives in African schools are normally impacted by a number of conditions that internal and external; including poor project supervision, reduced chances for likely beneficiaries to engage in project determination inadequate resource mobilization (Batten, 2011). In Rwanda, initiatives within secondary schools
tend to create the sense the without finance nothing prospers. Ali (2012) observed that
others lack positive engagements with important players in efforts to eliminate allowance remunerations. The end result of neglecting positive engagements is, initiatives are constrained and poor completion pace arising from the absence of sense ownership in the iniatives.
Locally, the Kenyan government has put in place measures for enhancement of safe learning environments and this was first articulated through the formulation of safety standards policy for schools in 2008. The Constitution of Kenya, 2010 further recognizes the right of the child to protection from an environment with the ability to cause harm in terms of physical, mental, spiritual, moral and social development. Children Act (2001) entitles the child to the right of protection from physical, psychological abuse and neglect (IFAC, 2013).
The Kenyan Constitution of 2010 in the 4th schedule, article 185(2), 186(1) and 187(2) outlines the division of the roles among the national government and the county governments. Policy formulation is a function of the national government. The cabinet secretary for Ministry of Education is obligated by authority from the Basic Education Act, 2013, to ensure that policies and guidelines are developed for the education sector. The County Education Boards (CEBs), BOMs and semi- autonomous government agencies (SAGAs) in the education sector, as corporate entities, are instrumental in customizing and implementing government policies at the institutional levels, in tandem with national education objectives; policies and legal frameworks (Republic of Kenya, 2016).
Many projects fail due to mismanagement and lack of coordination among various
stakeholders, specifically in secondary schools. In Kenya education projects like laboratories construction, the Kenya school equipment scheme, classroom
construction, information communication technology, dining halls construction, water supply, among other initiatives have either been implemented with hardships or even stagnating at the paperwork step level. Their failure to be completed shortly before or after implementation, speaks volumes of project profligacy that though widely talked of, have not been documented. Success in project completion thus will depend greatly on effective leadership and organization and mutual coexistence between projects particular requirements and facilities provided at the local level (Ndagi, 2013).
BOMs are therefore expected to cascade and entrench MOE policies, including safety standards policy, in secondary schools and ensure that the policies form the basis of decision making as they deliberate on the affairs of schools (Republic of Kenya, 2015). In relation to this study, safety standards implementation could be achieved through the influence of BOMs’ governance practices, which entails; operationalization of safety standards policy, execution of school budget, maintenance of physical infrastructure, and enforcing of school ethics and controls in schools.
In Imenti North sub-county a number of school projects and other project funded by CDF did not materialize. Kimathi (Daily Nation October 22nd, 2013) noted that some projects are ghost projects, this include DEB Municipality Secondary schools among others, where nothing has been done. In other cases, Mukiri (2014), in Imenti South sub-county noted that BOM faced many challenges while managing CDF school projects. School projects face numerous challenges in management and completion of projects such as inadequate project funding, poor financial management skills by the BOM and poor standard workmanship (DEO’s report 2012).
In Rachuoyo North Sub-County, many public secondary schools have been caught up
with inadequacy of physical infrastructure in the wink of implementation of No Child
Left Behind policy (SCEO, 2019). To ensure 100 percent transition rate many schools are engaging in infrastructural initiatives with funding sourced from parents, local authorities and sponsorship. The school BOM has shown governance practices in the development meeting as a result of differing views and notions. Further, the completion pace has encountered opposition whenever a single initiative is dragged as others involving multiple initiatives are completed once. The connection between the initiative and its completion in Rachuonyo North can vary in different schools. This is the background that the current study is seeking to establish whether BOM governance practices influence completion of school development projects.
