NN40, May 2008
Education for Sustainable Development? Or The Sustainability of Education Investment? A Special Issue
What are the Ground Rules for a Sustainable Donor Agency Intervention?
By Hiroaki Nagaoka, Community Action Development Organisation (CanDo), Tokyo
Email: nagaoka@cando.or.jpKeywords
Community Participation, Informed Consent, Consensus Building
Summary
This paper discusses external agency support to improving the standard of education in Kenya. It discusses the sustainability of education and community members? participation in school management decisions.
I have been working for community-based and participatory development projects in education, health and environment in marginalised areas in Kenya since 1995. This paper will discuss the sustainability of education and community members? participation through my experiences in the projects as well as my observations on parallel projects by other stakeholders on the ground.
In the 1990s the Kenyan government limited its support for public primary schools to dispatching teachers. Parents and their communities became more responsible for not only the provision of teachers? and pupils? personal items required for schooling but also the development of classrooms and other school facilities. On the other hand, headteachers were evaluated by the education office according to the development of their school facilities as well as their pupils? academic performance. Parents and the community members were indispensable resources for headteachers to have a good reputation and promotion. Thus, most head teachers heavily depended on their pupils? parents for developing school facilities in the form of cash and labour contributions. Although some head teachers might have regarded parents as resources to exploit, the headteachers inevitably had to have a good dialogue and form a consensus with not only the parents? representatives but also parents in general, or local community members, for the success of their school development projects. It was a great burden for community members to be responsible for financing the schools, but this situation had also created opportunities for parents to participate in the management of their schools. They were able to discuss with the head teachers about the way their money was spent for school management.
The introduction of compulsory free primary education in Kenya in 2003 has influenced this relationship between head teachers and parents. Substantial funding was disbursed to all public primary schools in the country by directly remitting to each school?s bank account from the central government. The fund is claimed from the account with the signatures of the headteacher and the parents? representatives. At the same time, the government restricted head teachers from collecting any money for school management from parents.
The Free Primary Education policy certainly removed the financial burden from community members, and it has had many good effects in the Kenyan education. However, this policy has also led to the reduction of the actual participation of community members in school management on the ground. A story of how the budget for the improvement of facilities is used illustrates the current situation.
The government fund disbursed to schools also includes some budget for facility improvement. I believe that the priority for spending the budget should be placed on the improvement of facilities for children, who study in crowded and poor resourced classrooms. However, there are some schools that utilised the fund for renovating and furnishing headteachers? and teachers? staff-rooms, and many classrooms remained untouched for years. The priority is placed on the improvement of facilities for teachers, not for pupils.
Although a democratic and participatory procedure for consensus building with parents on spending the fund was set by the government, parents may not make objection to the facility improvement plans made by head teachers. In many cases, many of them are not even informed of the existence of the fund available for certain purposes. The detailed information is circulated only amongst a limited number of people in the schools.
With the fund being a government fund, headteachers tended to be regarded as the sole custodian of the fund and many parents believed that they were freed from any burden for school management matters. This notion led to the reduction of opportunities for parents to participate in school management. Therefore, it might be unnecessary for some head teachers to have a dialogue and form a consensus with parents but only necessary to control a limited number of their representatives so that parents might not have any objection in formalising their spending plans. This situation also denies opportunities for parents to be informed and to discuss what kinds of improvement for their children?s education are possible by the fund, and to form a consensus. Thus, the parents miss the opportunity for the process to enhance their capabilities for sustaining and improving education for their children through this participation of school management.
The current political and social crisis in connection with general election in 2007 in Kenya indicates a possibility to reduce the influx of public fund to primary schools. Then, parents may be regarded as the major resources in terms of cash and labour contribution for school development again. Under hardship, where both governmental and other resources are limited and less reliable, the participation of parents and the community in school management is a key element for sustaining primary education for their children.
If external agents are to support improving the education standard and attaining Education for All, it is important for the supporting project/programme to encompass the component of capability building for parents, which enable them to participate in school management equally, and to manage and utilise school resources effectively.
When parents paid their contribution to schools, it was easier for them to participate directly in school management. In reality, however, the influx of external, central government support reduced the level of parents? participation due to the structure of the support. The external agents identify where problems occur and make efforts to establish the systems and rules to solve those problems, but in order to make the systems and rules function properly, another type of effort is required in the assistance. These efforts include the sensitivity of the external government agents to the dynamism of local power relations at the grassroots and to create some opportunities to overcome the power relations through ensuring places for discussion and informed consent amongst various stakeholders at the grassroots. Furthermore, in the process of this participation, it is also entirely possible to develop the capability of parents to oversee and control the quality of the education, in a local, fully sustainable manner.
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