Education Ministry Prioritizes School Leadership and Management

As the Government continues its drive to create effective schools, through a modernization agenda, good leadership and management have become major factors and are being prioritized through improved training and greater accountability.
According to a Ministry Paper that was tabled in the House of Representatives on Tuesday (May 20), by Minister of Education, Andrew Holness 731 primary school principals have received leadership and management training through a Canadian programme now franchised to colleges in Jamaica, while 44 secondary principals have been trained under a University of the West Indies (UWI) programme, with a further 75 to be trained in three cohorts over the next three years.
In addition, a comprehensive training programme for education officers, school boards, and school leadership teams is being developed for implementation starting in the 2008/09 academic year, while a national professional qualification for principals will be introduced that will become a prerequisite for appointment.
Leadership standards will be developed through the Jamaica Teaching Council working in conjunction with the proposed Jamaica Educational Leadership Academy (JELA). This body will develop leadership training focusing on competencies and individual development. It will work closely with providers across Jamaica. JELA will analyze future training needs, improve upon existing training, broaden training to include aspiring school leaders, and incorporate succession planning that reflects the changes that modernisation will effect.
As it relates to performance management, the Ministry Paper stated that new appraisal instruments for principals and guidance counsellors have been piloted in Regions Four and Five; an extensive training programme for participants has been undertaken; and an appraisal was rolled out to all regions from January 2008 and will be fully in place in September 2008.
In addition, the teacher appraisal instrument and system are being reviewed to make them more manageable; the legal framework to enable proper management of accountability is being reviewed; and Regional Education Authorities (REAs) will have a stronger focus on school review and improvement, and this is reflected in the new job descriptions for school improvement officers.
Under modernization, a coherent performance management system is being developed that will link targets for senior managers at the Ministry and regional levels through to schools. Target setting and monitoring are features of the literacy and numeracy strategies.
Better school management is expected to come from more effective use of data, greater capacity for self evaluation and improved school planning, and activities surrounding this include: the development of better data on school and student performance including trends, benchmarking and value-added data; new school profiles to enable school managers to plan and evaluate their work better and to set targets for improvement; and use of this data by REAs for monitoring schools and by the new Inspectorate. A new self evaluation instrument is in preparation for piloting in 2008/09 and an analysis of school improvement planning and how this is monitored, is in progress.
Teacher quality is also a critical part of the process and therefore, the Consortium of Teacher Training Institutions (CITE) is upgrading teacher training in colleges and this will be rolled out in some tertiary institutions as of September 2008.
The School Management Work-stream is also addressing issues relating to students with special educational needs. A revised special education policy was developed and a research study on special educational needs in Region Six was undertaken by the UWI. The policy sets out minimum standards for provision and support at all levels of the system and articulates the need for special education coordinators in all schools.
The special education coordinator has now begun a programme of work to: undertake an audit of special educational needs; develop an early identification, referral and placement system; identify the human resource needs to manage and deliver provision; improve the use of technology to support special education; revise and develop teacher training syllabi in special education; and develop a training programme
A ‘Child Find’ initiative will be launched in June 2008 to identify students whose needs are undiagnosed.