Making school improvement a manageable and sustainable processfrom school to district level

Presented by

Dr Sue Westraad

Project Manager

GM South Africa Foundation

Abstract

Background:

The GM South Africa Foundation has developed and piloted a number of Whole School Evaluation and Development projects since 1995. A primary focus of these projects has been to make WSE and WSD a manageable process at both a school and circuit level. In addition the Foundation has worked with schools and Circuit Managers to find ways of making school evaluation and development a non-threatening process that has authentic and sustainable impact at a school level.

Methods:

The Foundation has worked within the parameters of South African WSE and WSD policy to explore ways of making both the school self evaluation (SSE) and subsequent school development process as user friendly, manageable and authentic as possible. The initial pilot process moved from working in depth with eight schools to piloting a more extensive process with a 124 schools in Port Elizabeth. The Foundation in partnership with the PE District Office and the pilot schools has extended the DoE WSE criteria into a WSE instrument. The Foundation has also developed a webhosted database that can be used by both schools and other agencies to capture WSE data for reflection, management, planning and reporting purposes.

Results:

A user friendly WSE instrument has been developed together with a web-hosted database that can be replicated by other agencies. Best practice guidelines and key findings around the process of School Self Evaluation and School Development have been documented. All of these are available to schools and other agencies for evaluation and development purposes.

Conclusions:

For School Evaluation and Development to be a meaningful and manageable experience it needs to be supported by the right instruments, systems, processes and resources. Encouraging schools and officials to embrace school evaluation as a developmental process within an ethos of growth and honesty is central to this.

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Introduction

The GM South Africa Foundation (GMSAF) is a non-profitdevelopment agency based in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. TheFoundation was established in 1994 by General Motors SouthAfrica as a project management agency commissioned to identifylogjams in education and housing and implement innovative andworkable projects to address them. The Foundation’s activitiesare structured around a cycle that involves the development,piloting, refinement and replication of successful projectsand interventions.

From the time of its inception, the GMSAF has developed andpiloted a number of education models. The Foundation worksclosely within the framework of South African educationpolicies and pays special attention to issues around thepracticalities of policy implementation. Towards the end of2002 the Foundation undertook a process of reflection toconsider the range of education and training projects it hadimplemented and their impact. The Foundation realised thatalthough it had a number of projects that targeted differentareas of schooling, it had no project that addressed thedevelopment of a school as entity. The result was that schoolfactors extraneous to the various projects would ofteninfluence their success. Work on individual school levelprojects and with the Port Elizabeth District OfficeDepartment of Education also indicated the pressing need for

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an intervention that could assist with the holisticimprovement of schools.

With this in mind, the GMSAF launched the Learning Schools Initiativein 2003. This initiative adopted a whole school developmentapproach; while primarily situated within the National WholeSchool Evaluation policy (2001), the initiative also interactswith other relevant national, provincial and local policieswithin a Whole School Evaluation and Development Framework.

This paper briefly describes the Learning Schools Initiativeand highlights some of the project experiences, as well asrelated instruments and processes that could be of value toothers working in the field of school development, as well asfor schools themselves.

The Learning Schools Initiative

The Learning Schools Initiative originated from the strategic decisionto draw the GMSAF’s individual education projects into aholistic framework. This was based on the reflection thatwhile many of the Foundation’s school-based projects andprogrammes were successful in their own right, they oftenstruggled to take root in schools due to factors such as alack of support from the full school community, poorrelationships among staff members, lack of vision within theschool, poor school leadership, etc. Thus, while theFoundation acknowledged the strength of individual projectsthat targeted specific groups of educators or learners acrossschools, it was also acknowledged that the Foundation neededto be working at a more systemic level both within schools andwith the Department of Education’s District Office.

The background research for a whole school developmentinitiative commenced in October 2002 and a proposal describingthe initiative and its primary objectives was presented to theGMSAF trustees and approved in November 2002. In the

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initiative whole school development was interpreted both astargeting all areas of a school and involving all members ofthe school community in the process.

In May 2003, the GMSAF hosted a forum where key individualsworking in whole school development and education in SouthAfrica were invited to make presentations and discuss methodsof whole school development, related challenges and successstrategies. Once the initiative was underway, a follow upforum was held in September 2003. The papers presented atthese two forums together with summaries of key issues werepublished in the form of forum proceedings (GM South AfricaFoundation, 2004). In October 2004, the GMSAF hosted anotherforum which focused on sustaining educational developmentprojects. This forum was attended by non-governmentorganisation representatives working in school development andeducation, and representatives from the Eastern CapeProvincial and District Departments of Education.

Since the GMSAF is a small organisation with limited capacityand funding, initial piloting tends to take place on a smallscale. Although this is not always ideal, piloting of theGMSAF models is fairly intensive and mistakes have minimalimpact. The GMSAF is a well respected agency within the PortElizabeth community and co-ordinators and project workers tendto work very closely with programme participants who sharevaluable information with them which enables the developmentof relevant education models.

The Learning Schools Initiative moved through the following projectphases:

2003 to 2005 – piloting a preliminary WSD model with twosecondary schools

2005 to 2008 – rolling out a revised model with five primaryschools

2009 to 2011 – refining the model and piloting it within aCircuit model

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2012 onwards – rolling out the model to other circuits andprovinces, while continuing to implement the model withinseven Port Elizabeth schools.

The intensive nature of the piloting process meant that theproject team were able to incorporate new insights into thedeveloping model as they emerged. In keeping with the GMSAF’sfocus on replication, as soon as reliable documentation andinstruments were developed these were shared with allinterested parties and further refined based on feedback andcontinued piloting.

The GMSAF model and certain of its aspects continue to beapplied in a variety of different contexts, both as part ofthe ongoing piloting and development process, and of thereplication process. The model is continuously updated andrefined to ensure that it incorporates new findings andremains applicable to our ever changing education landscape.

Thus, while the Foundation acknowledged the strength ofindividual projects that targeted specific groups of educatorsor learners across schools, it was acknowledged that theFoundation needed to be working at a more systemic level bothwithin schools and with the Department of Education’s DistrictOffice.

The background research for a whole school developmentinitiative commenced in October 2002 and a proposal describingthe initiative and its primary objectives was presented to theGMSAF trustees and approved in November 2002. In theinitiative whole school development was interpreted both astargeting all areas of a school and involving all members ofthe school community in the process.

In May 2003, the GMSAF hosted a forum where key individualsworking in whole school development and education in SouthAfrica were invited to make presentations and discuss methodsof whole school development, related challenges and successstrategies. Once the initiative was underway, a follow up

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forum was held in September 2003. The papers presented atthese two forums together with summaries of key issues werepublished in the form of forum proceedings (GM South AfricaFoundation, 2004). In October 2004, the GMSAF hosted anotherforum which focused on sustaining educational developmentprojects. This forum was attended by non-governmentorganisation representatives working in school development andeducation, and representatives from the Eastern CapeProvincial and District Departments of Education.

Since the GMSAF is a small organisation with limited capacityand funding, initial piloting tends to take place on a smallscale. Although this is not always ideal, piloting of theGMSAF models is fairly intensive and mistakes have minimalimpact. The GMSAF is a well respected agency within the PortElizabeth community and co-ordinators and project workers tendto work very closely with programme participants who sharevaluable information with them which enables the developmentof relevant education models.

The Learning Schools Initiative moved through the following projectphases:

2003 to 2005 – development of and piloting of a preliminaryWSD model with two secondary schools

2005 to 2008 – rolling out a revised model with five primaryschools

2009 to 2011 – refining the model and piloting it within aCircuit model

2012 – implementation of the model in 7 new schools

The intensive nature of the piloting process means that theproject team are able to incorporate new insights into thedeveloping model as they emerge. In keeping with the GMSAF’sfocus on replication, as soon as reliable documentation andinstruments are developed these are shared with all interestedparties and further refined based on feedback and continued

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piloting. The GMSAF model and certain of its aspects continueto be applied in a variety of different contexts, both as partof the ongoing piloting and development process, and of thereplication process. The model is continuously updated andrefined to ensure that it incorporates new findings andremains applicable to our ever changing education landscape.

The Learning Schools Model

The term model tends to suggest a fixed and fairly rigidframework that must be adopted and applied as is. TheFoundation steers away from this idea of a model as a fixedconcept and applies it in the sense of a useful framework thatcontains practice and process suggestions supported byprogrammes and instruments that can be adapted and applied insimilar development contexts. Hopkins (1996) distinction ofschools at different levels, together with the numerousdistinguishing features that make our South African schools sodifferent means that we need to view schools and their needsdifferently when looking for solutions and interventions.However, having said this there are certain processes, such asself evaluation and school development that need to be engagedwith by all schools but maybe not all at the same time in thesame manner. The nature of the process and the resultingjourney may differ depending on the character and makeup ofthe school.

Despite the fact that there are no quick, easy or universal‘fixes’ for schools, many organisations working with schoolsand grappling with hard questions around school engagement,school transformation and improvement are proposing tentativeapproaches and possibilities. The result of these are valuableinsights at a variety of levels that need to be documented andshared in the endeavour to deepen our understanding of how todeliver quality education across the board in South Africanschools.

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The GMSA Foundation does not work with schools that aredysfunctional, except where dysfunctional schools have arecently appointed strong leader that requires assistance andsupport. Most radical transformations required to transformdysfunctional schools, even sometimes when there is a strongleader at the helm, generally require the intervention on thepart of the Department of Education and external organisationshave no power to intervene in these situations. However, withthe presence of a strong leader and sufficient critical massschools can be turned around.

The GMSA Foundation school development model is made up of anumber of components:

1. A Whole School Analysis – Assessing and Analysing wherethe school is currently

2. Planning for school improvement3. Programmes to address specific needs (i.e. leadership

development)4. Mentoring & school-based support.

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Diagram 1: School Improvement Phases

A brief description of these components is presented below.The way in which the Foundation interacts with schools aroundthese processes will depend on the number of schools that areparticipating in a project. For example where only a fewschools are involved then it will be possible to undertake awhole school evaluation workshop with the whole schoolcommunity. However, in the case of working with circuits of 30schools then the same process will be undertaken with arepresentative group from each school. These decisions arelargely determined by budget and human capacity.

A Whole School Analysis

In his book Schools Must Speak for Themselves: the Case for School Self-Evaluation (1999), John Macbeath says “it is an index of a nation’seducational health when its school communities have a high level of intelligence andknow how to use the tools of self evaluation and self-improvement”. Central

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Diagram 2: Components of each phase

to the Foundation’s approach to school development ismodelling a process of school self evaluation and improvementfor the schools on its projects. It is important that from theoutset school communities accept responsibility for regularlyevaluating where they are at different levels (i.e. school andclassroom) and for addressing areas that need improvement.While it is noted that schools, especially those situated inpoor communities, are reliant on assistance from theDepartment of Education for assistance in crucial areas suchas staffing and infrastructure– there is still much they cando by themselves.

One of the biggest challenges faced in this process to date,is the lack of an honest and transparent appraisal on the partof most schools – especially in the areas directly related toteaching and learning. This has been noted by the Foundationfacilitators particularly in the case of the 3 areas of WholeSchool Evaluation that relate to teaching and learning andmore recently in working with the educators individualperformance measurement appraisals. The lack of openness inthese areas is perhaps not surprising where appraisal is hasimplications linked to salary. The Foundation has made someheadway in this area through engaging in this process in anon-threatening way and encouraging them to be honest with theultimate goal of school improvement being to bring about theimprovement of learner achievements. While there is anobvious role for external evaluation of schools, it isimpossible for the Department of Education to undertake thisprocess as intensively as required with all schools in SouthAfrica.

The processes embedded in the IQMS documents that promote bothschool self-evaluation and educator self and peer evaluationcycles need to take place in ways that is meaningful anddevelopmental. Schools need, as professional learningcommunities, to undertake a process of critical self-evaluation at all levels and find ways of improving primarilywith the support of government.

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The first phase of the Foundation’s school improvement modelinvolves a three-fold school analysis process. This involves:

1. Undertaking a whole school self-evaluation2. Collating staff members performance measurement results3. Collating learner achievement results (i.e. Grade 1

baseline results, ANA results, CASS results and otherassessments that educators consider relevant).

1. Undertaking a whole school self-evaluation

The Foundation has developed a Whole School Evaluationinstrument based on the Department of Education’s WSEindicators. This instrument has been expanded to include otherareas of assessment that the Foundation has found important inits work with schools (e.g. counselling and psycho-socialsupport for learners).

A facilitator guides the school/s through the first SSEsession drawing their attention to the standard of qualityexpected in each area, and encouraging honesty with a view tosupported intervention in the areas identified for urgentimprovement.

The Foundation has in partnership with Ariel Solutionsdeveloped a database to assist with capturing the schoolevaluation data and to assist both the schools and otheragencies (DoE & NGO’s) working with schools. This database ishosted online, so evaluations can be entered as the schoolundertakes the SSE process, or recorded on a hardcopy andentered later. Based on how the school rates itself thereport generated via the database grades each Key PerformanceIndicator (e.g. discipline policy) according to 4 levels:

Excellent Acceptable Needs improvement Needs urgent improvement

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The school (and/or agency) can then identify which level ofneed they will focus on for the School Improvement Plan. Theexperience of the Foundation has been that most Port ElizabethSchools still have many areas that require urgent improvement.In such cases it is recommended that the schools focus only onthe areas that need urgent improvement for the time being.Schools that have fewer urgent needs can also include KPI’srated as need improvement in their School Improvement Plan. Eachschool receives a code to access their information on thedatabase. This means that they can update areas they haveworked in and generate reports for themselves as required.They can also undertake future self evaluations and make useof the database themselves.

2. Collating staff members performance measurement results

The Foundation has realised that, as is the case with the SSE,the process of identifying educator professional developmentneeds has to be initially modelled and educators need to beguided through a process by which they examine theirassessments and compile meaningful personal growth plans(PGP’s) that suggest relevant interventions. The challengesof the personal nature of this assessment have already beendiscussed above. If the ultimate goal of school improvement isto improve the quality of teaching and learning in a schoolthen equipping teachers and school leadership with the skillsin which to do this is a priority and projects that engagewith teachers around how best to do this in a way that yieldsvalid information are crucial.

3. Collating learner achievement results

The areas identified in (2) need to be supported withadditional data which indicates the specific areas of learnerperformance that require urgent attention. For example thegraph below shows the Grade 3 CASS numeracy results for aspecific school across five grade 3 classes. The areas thatrequire urgent intervention can be identified according tothis graph. Depending on the level of required intervention,

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analysis can be drilled down to the level of individualclasses and learners. Again such analysis should not be usedto place the blame with individual educators, but rather aspart of a developmental process. In primary schools, thegrade one baseline assessments provide a good starting pointfor attempting to remedy learning gaps and barriers tolearning at an early stage. As with all other forms ofassessments the assessment instruments need to be reliable andwhere teachers mark these assessments themselves, an ethos ofhonesty and development needs to be encouraged and supported.

Place Value

Doubling

Shape Pattern

Building & Breaking

Word problems (money)

3-digit addition & subtraction

Word problem multiplication

Measurement mass

Measurement analogue time

020406080100

Grade Three: Numeracy ResultsPE Primary

TOTAL SCORE PER QUESTION

Planning for school improvement

If school improvement is to be taken seriously by all roleplayers it needs to be planned for at all levels. Thisplanning can be challenging at the level of the school,especially where we are asking schools to adopt a holistic as

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opposed to a silo school improvement approach. At the level ofcircuit and district this becomes increasingly complex andsound instruments, management and tracking systems need to beput in place to assist all involved in school improvement tomanage, monitor and report on the process.

The GMSAF WSE database assists with this process and isconstantly being further refined with this in mind. Theultimate goal of the Foundation is to have all three levels ofschool analysis included in the database. However,identifying areas that require improvement is just the firststep in the process. Individual schools need to be initiallyguided through a process of moving from the analysis of keyareas for intervention to planning around what type ofinterventions will address their needs and moving these intoaction plans which specify who is responsible for doing whatby when.

Planning at a school level

Again, the Foundation has modelled this process for theschools on the Learning Schools Initiative so that they canuse the process demonstrated, or a similar process that suitstheir needs for future planning sessions. This processinvolves:

Examining the results of the whole school evaluation,educator needs analysis and learner performanceassessments and identifying key areas that requireintervention

Developing a School Improvement Plan that includes allthree areas and ensuring that individual educatorpersonal growth plans (PGP’s) and Phase or grade levelplans address areas around improving learner performance.

At the School Improvement Plan level to identify whatinterventions are tasks (i.e. something that can be donefairly quickly and ticked off, for example developing amaintenance checklist), and which are projects (thingsthat require long term planning and action for example

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raising funds for a sports field, or putting a plan inplace to address learners barriers to learning across theschool).

Developing action plans for both the tasks and projects.In the case of projects the ‘problem’ is analysed priorto embarking on a plan. For example if the ‘problem’ isthat parents do not attend parent meetings, then thecause for this needs to be identified first as differentcauses will result in different actions. If the parentsare not coming because the meetings are held in theafternoon when they are at work, this will require adifferent action to them not coming because they feelthat the teachers talk down to them.

As with all action plans the school plans need to haverealistic deadline and monitoring systems in place that holdindividuals or task/project teams responsible for what theyundertake to do. Schools also need to indicate in theirplanning what they undertake to do themselves and whatassistance and support they will source from others. Forexample they will generally approach the Department ofEducation for assistance with teaching and learning support.In some cases schools may have direct links with NGO’s andother providers who can assist them to meet their needs. TheGMSAF assists schools to develop fundraising skills so thatthey can target private donors to assist with meeting needsnot covered by the Department of Education.

It is crucial that schools are realistic about what they canundertake within each school year. The Foundation cautionsschools not to undertake more than 2 fairly large projects perannum and encourages the spacing of interventions across a 3year school development plan which is reviewed annually.

The GMSAF database provides a tool by which schools can accessand work with their own school improvement information. Schoolcan export reports into word and/or excel and prepare reportsfor different audiences. As the schools work on the areas that

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they have identified as needing improvement, they can trackimprovement in these areas with each subsequent schoolevaluation.

Planning at a Circuit and District level

The process of planning whole school interventions and for agroup of schools at a circuit level, involves working with theschool improvement plans (SIP’s) of the group of schools inthe circuit. A similar cycle of (1) assessing & analysing,(2) planning for improvement, (3) assisting with interventionsand support and (4) monitoring and reflecting needs to beengaged with at a Circuit, District and Provincial level.

While the School Improvement Plans of each Circuit are centralto the development of the Circuit Improvement Plan, Circuitsneed to also integrate the training and development needs ofthe Circuit staff, general needs such as Circuit resourcingand District, Provincial and National initiatives, such asCAPS training, etc. A similar process should be followed at aDistrict level.

The GMSAF database assists with this process whereby thoseresponsible for school improvement such as IMG Managers orEDO’s can access the whole school self evaluation of eachschool and through the use of filters and reports identifycritical development needs across schools.

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Diagram 3: Individual School Improvement Process

Diagram 4: School to Circuit Improvement Process

Implementing Interventions

If planning is taken seriously and is thorough then eachperson in the school community and at a broader circuit levelshould be aware of what their roles and responsibilities arein terms of implementation. It is during this phase that theschool community will see whether they have taken on too muchin certain areas and need to revise their school improvementplan.

Essentially implementation should take place at all levels ofthe school from that of the individual learner to teacher toschool management, parents and whole school interventions.Again, with the key focus on the improvement of learnerachievement all that happens should focus on ultimatelyimproving teaching and learning.

Monitoring & Reflecting

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Diagram 5: Circuit to District Improvement Process

At a school level monitoring systems and methods should havebeen integrated into the school improvement plan and shouldtake place on a number of levels around the specifiedinterventions. For example a school selected to secure asection of the school with a wall then this project needs tobe constantly monitored and reported on. Individual tasks alsoneed to be monitored and reported on e.g. developing a newlanguage policy. The Educators PGP’s need to be monitored andrevisited as interventions are put in place and central toschool improvement the learners achievement needs to monitoredthrough formal and informal assessment methods.

When the school takes stock of where they are and commenceswith the process of revising their school improvement planthen the outcomes of what they have undertaken during thecurrent year need to be reflected on and integrated into theschools revised plan. Where successes have been achievedthese need to be celebrated, not necessarily at the end of theyear but as milestones of encouragement along the way. Asimilar process is mirrored on a large scale at the Circuitand District level.

Conclusion

South African schools face complex challenges from thoseshared on a global level such as bullying to those relatedspecifically to poverty and our historical legacy. There areoften no easy fixes to these challenges and schooling itselfand particularly the role of the teacher has to be adjusted tocounter gaps in other areas. The school improvement processmust be implemented in such a way that it adds value andassistance to both schools and individuals at all levels. Itmust avoid becoming another administrative task that schoolshave to do in amongst many others. To achieve this schoolimprovement must be a simple and cohesive process at alllevels from learner to teacher to school to circuit todistrict improvement. In order to reinforce the value ofassessment and evaluation Circuits and Districts must take

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their schools’ improvement plans (learner, educator and wholeschool) seriously and respond to crucial areas that areidentified. Motivation, encouragement and support and theacknowledgement of growth and success must be central to theprocess.

References

Macbeath, J. 1999. Schools must speak for themselves: the case for school self-evaluation. New York: RoutledgeFalmer.

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