Enhancing School Management Teams in Promoting Sustainable, Equitable Resource Allocation in Rural Schools

Abstract

Most rural schools are victims of poor planning coupled with a lack of oversight from leadership of the school management team (SMT). However, the classification of schools as Section 21 without function C exacerbated the challenge of poor resource provision experienced by rural schools. Most Section 21 schools are rural, semi-rural, semi-urban and farm schools that experience the worst form of financial and physical resource deprivation. This study seeks to understand bottlenecks that derail equitable resource allocation and distribution to these schools. The Department of Basic Education (DBE) delegates fiduciary responsibility to the SMT to address all matters related to resource allocation guided by equity and social justice principles. Critical emancipatory research underpins this study and uses the contextual approach to unpack underlying assumptions that hinder equitable resource allocation within the schools in a rural context. There is also troubling evidence of a disconnect between the DBE and SMT, enabling the deliberate sabotage of rural education. Financial and physical resource allocation to rural schools provides extra motivation for school functionality by linking resources and learning. Rural schools, by design, are facing a plethora of challenges to resource allocation while the government opened up a policy of access to redress past imbalances.