Development of a school -based performance management framework for self-managing schools in South Africa

Abstract

With education at the centre of the South African government’s National Development Plan for 2030, an effective schooling system is not negotiable. A review of the literature showed that public schools in South Africa are self-managing. The performance of most of these schools are unsatisfactory with specific reference to academic performance, infrastructure, finances and resources. The review further revealed severe shortcomings with the use of the Integrated Quality Management System (IQMS) for school-based performance management. This included that the IQMS is insufficient, that its application is ineffective and that it does not support school-based performance management. It is a compliance system and does not allow schools’ stakeholders the freedom to take part in designing their own strategy for the school. The researcher argues that self-managing schools link to the Participatory Democracy Theory that ensures the involvement of stakeholders. The IQMS however, links to Managerialism, rejecting stakeholders’ independence of self-management and decision-making. Therefore, this study aimed to develop a school-based performance management framework for public schools in South Africa. Specific attention was given to the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) as a theoretical framework for its flexibility to accommodate diverse organisations. The BSC was placed in the Evolutionist theories under the Resource-Based View (RBV) approach, focussing on the uniqueness of organisations’ tangible or intangible resources. The researcher argued that a combination of the IQMS and the BSC might close the theoretical gap and contribute to school-based performance management in self-managing public schools. A qualitative research paradigm, embedded in the interpretivism philosophy, guided this study. A Design-Based Research (DBR) method was followed to develop the framework. The first phase was to develop a preliminary framework, using the IQMS and BSC as existing theoretical frameworks. The second phase consisted of two iterative cycles of testing and refinement of the framework in practice. For both cycles, the researcher conducted semi-structured interviews with the school’s principal, one member of the school’s governing body and one member of the school’s management team of the four selected schools. The third phase was a reflection on the design process to enhance the application of the framework.