To enhance school resourcing Barrack and his staff decided to: develop an active partnership with parents and make a direct appeal to the PTA to financially contribute towards teaching and learning activities; court the assistance of local politicians to improve school infrastructure; and, intensify school farming activities to raise additional income through the sale of school farm produce.
Revamp PTA, involve parents in funding.
In order to boost collaboration and partnership with parents and community Barrack rejuvenated the Baarie Parent Teacher Association through renewed regular meetings with its executive members and parents. This action helped to forestall a
Key finding 5.6
Barrack and his teachers implemented strategies to restore student discipline, create an academically challenging and healthy environment that sustains learning as a short- term plan.
They instilled strict discipline among students through deterrence measures
(punishments) and through positive means (rewards) such as awards for hard work, academic excellence and good conduct, and encouraged cleanliness and healthy lifestyles. These measures resulted in four positive transformations. First, teachers recommitted themselves to teaching effectively, and students responded positively to disciplinary measures and showed renewed enthusiasm for studies. Second,
disciplinary measures dissuaded and reduced absenteeism and lateness to school. Third, students not only became sanitation and health conscious, but also took their studies more seriously and actively participated in all academic activities. Fourth, academic work and students’ achievement improved.
As a long-term strategy, Baarie advocated partnership with parents and teacher cooperation to enhance student discipline, cleanliness and healthy lifestyles that sustain learning.
98 dysfunctional PTA and culminated in the recruitment of resources to supplement the School’s efforts (Ba Principal Interview, 10/02/2010; Field Notes, 14/01/2010).
As a sign of respect and interest in the community, Barrack visited occasionally the local chiefs and elders and also some parents at weekends ((Ba Parents FG Meeting, 20/01/2010; Field Notes, 14/01/2010). Since Barrack began to involve the parents and helped to conduct PTA meetings on a regular basis, parents responded positively and showed interest in the School and cooperated with Baarie in several respects. Parents paid PTA levies to fund the School’s resourcing and also assisted the School by collaborating in maintaining student discipline. They supported the Head and teachers whenever certain parents tried to unduly interfere in school disciplinary measures. The PTA and parents also motivated hard working teachers in the form of awards for excellence in teaching (Ba Parents FG Meeting, 20/01/2010; Ba Teachers FG Meeting, 15/02/2010). One teacher affirmed the good rapport that was being developed between the School and the PTA when he remarked: “On every occasion the PTA chairman is here, the relationship is okay. I have never seen or heard of any problems with the PTA officers” (Ba Teachers FG Meeting, 15/02/2010).
Contributing levies to support the School came at a cost to parents. A parent explained that it was difficult for them to always find the required money to pay for PTA levies and also pay for their children’s note books and other school materials. However, they sometimes sacrificed a lot in order to save money and pay the PTA dues. They sacrificed by “not buying pito on market days” (Ba Parents FG Meeting,
20/01/2010). ‘Pito’ is the locally brewed beer which is very popular with both men and women in Saboba. Buying pito and sharing it with friends was the most popular form of socialising in Saboba locality. In general, people who normally do not drink pito at home would join a group in the village once a week, on a market day and enjoy some pito. A market day is a weekday set aside by the villagers to sell their farm produce and domestic animals in an open market. Farmers from neighbouring and distant villages participate in these weekly market days. Normally, people do not go to farm on this day and after selling their produce, they would sit in groups and drink pito as they socialise. Another parent remarked that she always attended PTA meetings because she wanted to directly hear from the PTA executives and School authorities what they had to
contribute as they did not trust their children, who sometimes demanded more money than what was required by the School (Ba Parents FG Meeting, 20/01/2010).
99 Some ex-students explained that they assisted their parents in the farms so that they would willingly pay for their school materials and PTA levies (Ba Ex-Students FG Meeting, 18/01/2010). They also served as intermediaries between the School and their parents. Students would normally inform parents on issues discussed at school and would invite their parents to PTA meetings. Students therefore cooperated in the re- organisation and rejuvenation of Baarie PTA and partnership with parents and community.
PTA levies were used by Baarie to undertake a number of resourcing and support programs. PTA funds helped to repair broken down school furniture, to begin the construction of a new pit latrine, rewire and install electric lights in one classroom and also to award prizes in form of pens, pencils, note books and text books to
deserving high-achieving students. Furthermore, PTA levies were used to pay token remuneration to teachers who participated in extra-tutorials and to award prizes in form of farm produce or token cash donations to deserving teachers, who distinguished themselves by preparing students who recorded the best BECE grades in the subjects those teachers used to teach. Barrack explained that:
The PTA is helping us, as you know, by way of collecting levies. We have an account for awarding high performing students in debates and so on. Now especially, the parents are paying levies to help build toilets for the school. Current facilities are not enough. (Ba Principal Interview, 10/02/2010)
Seeking help from politicians, education officers.
Barrack explained that as Principal it was his duty to link the School and the community so that “whatever needs that the school may have, the community will come to assist” (Ba Principal Interview, 10/02/2010). Besides PTA funding for lights in one classroom, Barrack also succeeded in procuring additional funding for the wiring and installation of electric lights in the remaining two classrooms and adjacent verandas of the School. Having lights in the classrooms at night made it possible for students to return to school in the evenings and study. Some students would study in groups under the lights on the verandas. Lighting of classrooms also invigorated more individual learning by students after normal school hours, mainly by students whose houses had no electric lighting (Ba Current Students FG Meeting, 17/01/2010). This extra funding for lighting the remaining two classrooms and adjacent verandas came from the former Member of Parliament for the Saboba Constituency, explained Mr Barrack.
Furthermore, Barrack courted the assistance of the local Education Office in resourcing the School through government grants for purchase of text books and other
100 teaching materials (Ba Principal Interview, 10/02/2010; Ex-District Director Interview, 09/01/2010).
Employing students’ labour in school farming to boost school income.
Barrack also re-introduced school farming where maize and groundnuts were cropped, harvested and sold as another means of generating internal income for school expenditure. Students explained that they normally worked in the School farm on Fridays. Sometimes, they also worked in other farms which belonged to local farmers for a fee, which was paid to the School (Ba Current Students FG Meeting, 17/01/2010). The Principal acknowledged this during an interview (Ba Principal Interview,
10/02/2010). Parents, local education officers and community leaders were in accord with the practice of students working in School farms and in third party farms to generate income for their School’s learning and teaching programs and for improving school infrastructure (Ba Parents FG Meeting, 20/01/2010; Community leaders FG Meeting, 12/12/2009; Circuit Supervisor Interview, 27/01/2010).
Sustain resourcing by community partnership and school farms.
Barrack had also considered making savings towards his long-term objective of purchasing PCs and other ICT equipment to enhance ICT lessons. These savings could also be used in acquiring additional essential but costly text books for the School. Other long-term strategies Barrack envisaged to sustain resourcing and income generation were to maintain the interest of parents in supporting the School through regular PTA meetings and casual visits to a few parents. Also, the School was to maintain students’ interest in school farming activities, to produce higher farm yields, without sacrificing overly the time for teaching and learning, and sports.
101 The implementation of all these short-term and long-term strategies in Baarie helped the School to radically improve the academic atmosphere and to succeed in producing the best BECE results in the Saboba District within two years. Barrack proudly stated that in 2009, they had set a specific mission for the School and they were able to achieve it. He said: “Last year we set our mission; our mission was to make sure that the School would perform well during the BECE examinations, and we were able to achieve that”. This was confirmed by an analysis of the BECE results of all Junior High Schools in the Saboba District for 2009 (GES: Saboba, 2010).
This rapid positive transformation seemed to have set in motion certain values which were being developed by the Baarie school community and were helping to sustain these gains and support Baarie’s efforts to restore its lost glory and become once again the top-achieving school in the District.