Perception of Head Teachers and District Education Officers (DEOs) on School Infrastructure Policy Governance in Somaliland

Stephen J Kamau,Charles M Rambo,John Mbugua

doi:10.13189/ujm.2021.090103

Abstract

The study examined the effectiveness and shortfalls of the school infrastructure policy governance system in Somaliland. The study was a cross-sectional survey, using mixed methods of inquiry. The target population was 920 headteachers and 82 DEOs. The sample was 257 headteachers and 22 DEOs. Multistage sampling was used. Purposive sampling was used to sample regions. Stratified random sampling was used to sample headteachers and simple random sampling to sample DEOs from the sampled regions. Pilot testing of the questionnaire was done on 28 headteachers. Reliability was ensured by Cronbach alpha while peer review and pilot testing ensured validity. Data were collected from headteachers using self-administered questionnaires while DEOs were interviewed. Twenty DEOs and 247 headteachers responded to the study. Interview data were analysed using thematic analysis while questionnaire data were analysed by descriptive statistics, frequency and percentage distributions. The school infrastructure policy implementation was ineffective, and the policy administrative structure was ineffective but the policy was stable. There is a need for the ministry to review its policy administration structures to make them effective. The school inspection criteria should be made available in all schools.

Highlights

School infrastructure policy is one of many policies that make up the education policy
Of the 22 District Education Officers (DEOs) sampled for interviews, 20 were interviewed while 2 were unavailable being on leave
The policy administrative structure was ineffective, implementation of the school infrastructure policy was ineffective, the school infrastructure policy was stable, the inspection criteria for school infrastructure projects was unclear in some schools, some school inspectors were biased, the ministry approved school infrastructure projects before their commencement - though not all the time and, the ministry approved newly completed infrastructure projects before they were commissioned for use

Summary

Introduction

School infrastructure policy is one of many policies that make up the education policy. Policy governance stipulates how the policy regulation functions are administered and implemented and by whom. It lays out the scope within which decisions accruing from the implementation of the policy are made, processes and procedures that are followed and the bodies who do those tasks [1]. It denotes the design - legal and institutional- of the regulation system itself and how it is built to function [1]. In the case of school infrastructure policy, policy governance covers aspects such as schools’ infrastructure policy administration structure, school infrastructure

Methods

Results

Conclusion