PROBLEMAS EN LA ENTREGA DE MEDICAMENTOS – DEFENSORIA DEL ASEGURADO

Other common threads that emerged from the research findings are on the school’s organisational capacity to manage community expectations and on the competence and capacity of external stakeholders to participate in school based management that were evident in the ability of education stakeholders to manage the partnership (e.g. power and voice) between the school and the community.

8.2.1. Internal School Capacity

Increased teacher involvement in key areas of school management (such as in school improvement planning, management of school projects, etc.) was observed in all school sites (see Chapter 5). Findings are that teachers, apart from their primary teaching duties, were involved in various stages of the school improvement planning (see Table 5.3), were appointed to various school cross-functional committees, and

were entrusted leadership positions in school projects. This involvement of teachers in key areas of school management improved their competence in non-teaching functions and helped create a sense of shared responsibility in the school. This supports Wohlstetters’ (1995) and Caldwell’s (2005) findings that providing more opportunities for teacher-led decisions is one of the conditions that make SBM work better at the school level. (see Box 2 for the experience of US2 in this area).

However, while teacher participation in various areas of school management opened opportunities for skills enhancement, according to the teachers, this placed a strain on their ability to perform their primary teaching and learning function which was evident in schools with a small complement of teaching personnel such as in RS1 and RS2. In addition, it was observed that teachers were, at times, co-opted to occupy vacated positions as some teacher respondents had no knowledge of some of the non-teaching committee or tasks assigned to them.

Another theme observed in the majority of the schools was teachers’ perception that external stakeholders tend to ‘overstep’ and impinge on their responsibilities in the school (see Chapter 5). The examples of overstepping suggested by teachers were primarily about roles that were outside of the ‘traditional’ areas of engagement by

external stakeholders in school-based management (e.g. classroom discipline, on classroom project implementation).

Notwithstanding the context and the manner with which these opinions were expressed, the ability to articulate and lend voice to opinions, according to Paul (1992) is critical in effective participation. It is through this that external stakeholders shape policy and inform and/or influence the delivery of educational services in the community. According to Rocha Menocal and Sharma (2008), the ability to voice opinion is an expression of the external stakeholders’ innate power to articulate their concerns regarding a service, which, in the Philippine context, most believe will be their means to alleviate poverty. Hence, it is disconcerting when external stakeholders’ ability to articulate or voice opinions is labelled as ‘overstepping’ because it manifests profound concerns over how internal stakeholders view community engagement within the context of decentralised education management.

First, this perception is an indication of the internal capacity11 _{of the school to manage} community engagement. Education decentralisation and an appreciation of the dual role of the school in the community place undue pressure on the teachers who had not been adequately prepared to manage community engagement and expectations. The introduction of decentralisation and the greater engagement of stakeholders in education management exposes the lack of internal school capacity to manage participation and community empowerment that necessitates the development of new sets of competence in internal stakeholders. This finding concurs with Caldwell’s (2005, p.18) view that ‘capability building in the successful experience

of school-based management’ is critical.

11 _{Capacity is defined in this research as both capability (knowledge, skills, attitudes) and systems/mechanism /processes}

Second, it exposes the implicit boundaries placed on external stakeholders’ participation in schools, which goes to the core of shared governance, responsibility, and accountability. Decentralisation is a change process that opens avenues for greater participation of education stakeholders in school management. Therefore, schools cannot act as if it is just ‘business as usual’ (Wohlstetter (1995 p. 23) and go about performing their tasks unmindful of the changes in the way the Department conducts and delivers its business. When external stakeholders are asked to share in the responsibility and accountability of improving learning outcomes of the community youth, schools should be proactive and expect increased external stakeholder engagement. Furthermore, expecting external stakeholders to share accountability for improving school learning outcomes given that they have partial to no control over the school’s strategic direction is unreasonable and unrealistic.

Gibson and Woolcock (2008) suggest that ‘empowerment is a fundamentally

conflictual process’ (p. 153) in which communities may challenge the long-standing

views and practices of school management at the school. Therefore, employing community participation requires a degree of openness, competence from the school (and the education sector, in general) and a rethinking of current organisational processes to better manage and facilitate community interest and engagement channelling these into productive results for the school and the community. This confirms Cook’s (2007) view of the manifest gap between expectation (as indicated in the legal mandate) and actual undertaking of decentralisation and Wohlstetter’s (1995) view of the ‘extent of system-wide changes that decentralisation entails’ (p.1).

Finally, it is reflective of the value that internal stakeholders place on the ability of external stakeholder to participate in the more substantive areas of management in the school. Internal stakeholders’ view of overstepping may come from an understanding that external stakeholders do not have the qualifications or experience