Principals’ Administrative Process Strategies For The Achievement Of Quality Assurance In Secondary Schools In Kogi State

INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

Education could be seen as an instrument for achieving socio- economic and technological growth and development of any nation. It is an instrument par-excellence and the means of developing human intellect, technical skills, character and effective citizenship for self-reliance and effective national development (FRN, 2004). A simple way of appreciating education is that it is a tool or a necessary weapon that is needed by every human being in order to effectively navigate this complex world (Aguba, 2009). Education in essence is the most effective instrument for academic progress, social mobilization, political survival and effective national development of a country, it constitutes the single largest enterprise in  Nigeria (Akpa, 2002). The educational policy of any nation is to achieve education for all (E.F.A.) (Moest, 2008). The priority is to ensure equitable access and improvement in the quality and efficiency of all level of  education.

The concern of the principal of secondary school is to direct the activities of teachers, students and other staff in the school towards  the  school objectives. The roles to be performed by the school principal can be categorized into two, namely:

1 supervision of school programmes which include: curricula and extra curricula activities (allocation of schedule of duty or subjects, school time table, school organization, etc.)

 interpersonal relation which involves school discipline, evaluation of teachers performance, community support and  involvement, helping  in solving staff and student personal problems e.t.c.

The principal of a school is a planner, director, controller, coordinator, organizer, adviser and a problem-solver (Maduabuchi, 2002). He identifies and set goals and objectives of the school, which of course, must be in line with the national objectives, analyses tasks and share responsibilities to the staff according to specialization and expertise (Ugochi, 2007). The status of secondary school principal is not gender discriminating. Therefore,  a principal can either be a male or female. A good principal should champion the course of quality assurance in his or her school to ensure a better school administration.

The ultimate goal of education administration at all levels is  to  develop an all inclusive and quality education that is accessible and relevant for self reliance. This is guided by the understanding that good education contributes significantly to economic growth, improvement of employment prospects and income generating opportunities for sustainable development. For qualitative education to be achieved in a nation, the teacher (human resources) financial and instructional facilities (material resources) must be co-operatively organized. In other words, the teacher in secondary school must be well trained and supervised (assisted), the learners continuously evaluated and funds and facilities adequately provided.

There is a number of administrative processes that exist to assist the administrator in carrying out his day-to-day activities. An administrator who ignores these processes is likely to encounter problems in the task of school administration. Hence, administration is seen as a collection of processes dealing with the various ways in which human and material resources are utilized to achieve set goals in an organization. These processes include such elements as planning, decision making, organizing, coordinating, motivating, directing, evaluating, staffing, and budgeting. Enyi in Ogbonnaya (2013) stressed that administrative process can therefore be regarded  as the sum  total of the various processes of planning, organizing, stimulating, coordinating, staffing, budgeting, communication and evaluating, which aid administrators in the utilization of resources in the achievement of organizational goals.

Within the school system, virtually all the various aspect of the school programmes and activities should be planned. According to Oboegbulem (2011) planning is the process of deciding in advance, the methods and procedures which an individual, group or organization intends to follow in order to accomplish its outlined objectives. The important thing in planning   is to decide, in advance, the objectives to be achieved and how to utilize the available resources in achieving these objectives. In other words, to plan is to decide in advance what is to be done and how to do it. The scarcity of resources makes the need more necessary, since the little available resources have to be evenly spread to reach every competing segment.

No administrator can function alone without the assistance of others. Thus, in other to achieve the set educational objectives,  the administrator must have a frame work or structure for his school on which  posts  are created and assigned to people.   Enyi (1999) sees organizing in schools as   an administrative process of having a structure and assigning people to the posts for the purpose of performing specific duties. It is sometimes seen as a process on which an administrator identifies and groups the work to be done in smaller units, and assigns people to the various units with relevant materials and authority. Organizing in schools enables the principal to assign duties to academic and non academic staff according to competence and it tends to minimize conflict in schools, since each person knows what to do. Organizing helps the principal to coordinate the various organizational activities, since he is aware of the various assignments given to individuals.

Principals, who are charged with the responsibility of utilizing human and material resources in schools, need to have the ability to coordinate these resources in order to achieve the desired results.  Nwankwo  (1982),  explained coordination as a process whereby an orderly pattern of  group effort is developed to ensure unity of action in the pursuit of common goals.

 Thus, a secondary school with various departments, units and  individuals with different functions need to be properly coordinated to ensure that the set school objectives are achieved. Coordination may therefore be defined as the process of directing and harmonizing resources and group activities for achieving set educational goals without friction.

In the school situation, staff personnel administration forms an important responsibility of the school administration in achieving the goals   of the school in particular and education in general. Staffs in the secondary schools include not only the teachers, but also non teaching staff, clerk, watchmen, labourers, cooks, and laboratory attendants. Teaching and non- teaching staff are important tools in the hands of the secondary school principals in achieving educational objectives.

The functional scope of staff personnel administration as  stated  in Enyi 1999, includes responsibilities of the administrator in;

 Determining the personnel needs of the school, (tutorial and non- tutorial);

 Satisfying personnel needs;

 Maintaining and improving services of the staff.

In educational institution, the budget is prepared by the bursary department or finance office as the case may be. Ogbonnaya (2005) had defined budget as the financial statement of the proposed expenditure and expected revenue of the government, public corporations, or educational

institution for a particular period of time. The budget usually covers a period of one year. It shows clearly the expected income and proposed expenditure of government or an educational institution for the coming year. The principal must be sure of what revenue is to be anticipated and from what sources it is to be derived before preparing his budget for the school. Budget controls the financial behavior of principals in a school system and prevent waste or reckless spending of fund provided for various educational services. The administrative dealings of various secondary schools in Kogi state  seems to have been hindered by numerous problems. These problems may include: poor supervision, conflict among teachers, inadequate funding, inadequate facilities, lack of principal-teacher relationship, and poor leadership styles of the principal among others. Some school principals in Kogi State seem to lack vision, there appears to be inadequate job analysis and work plan with poor instructional supervision which culminated into poor curriculum delivery in schools and consequently poor academic performance by the students. As far as the position of a principal is concerned, the issue of “gender” is very crucial because a principal could either be a male (man) or female (female).

Gender refers to the socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women. To put it another way: "Male" and "female" are sex categories, while "masculine" and "feminine" are gender categories (Ivan, 2008). Gender plays