What about us? Teachers’ participation in schools’ strategic action plans
Abstract
Schools in various parts of the world adopt plans or projects to improve the quality of school processes and students’ learning. Therefore, it is important to understand the processes of strategic planning such as teachers’ participation on decision making related to school plans. Apparently a limited number of studies have hitherto been conducted on teachers’ participation in strategic planning. The purpose of this paper is to examine teachers’ participation in decision making and strategic action planning in Portuguese schools. A survey employing self-administered scales was taken. Teachers' participation, other stakeholders’ participation, planning, and decision making, professional development, plans’ importance and validation, and ownership were the dimensions considered. Data were collected from 804 Portuguese teachers. Participants reported moderate to high levels of participation in strategic action plans, but they also reported moderate to low levels of participation in overall school decisions, plans’ importance and validation, sense of ownership and recognition of relevant opportunities for professional development. These results indicate that participation and collaboration are essential determinants of plan and action success in educational contexts. The participative nature of decision making and strategic planning seems to underscore the relevance, value and adequacy of schools’ plans from the perspective of teachers. However, differences in these dimensions related to teachers’ experience and professional roles also point to lower levels of participation from some teachers, which may hinder their involvement in school actions and improvement. This study suggests the need to explore the dominant types of participation and collaboration in Portuguese schools and to analyse the importance of other variables.
Keywords
Thanks
This study was funded by EDULOG - Fundação Belmiro de Azevedo and by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (Ref. UID/CED/04872/2019).
References
- Adelman H. & Taylor, L. (2007). Systemic change for school improvement. Journal of Educational and Psychological Consultation, 17(1), 55-77. https://doi.org/10.1207/s1532768Xjepc1701_3
- Ali, H. (2012). The quest for strategic Malaysian Quality National Primary School Leaders. International Journal of Educational Management, 26(1), 83 – 98.
- Ali, H. (2018). Validating a model of strategic leadership practices for Malaysian vocational college educational leaders. European Journal of Training and Development, 43(1/2), 21-38. https://doi.org/10.1108/EJTD-03-2017-0022
- Bell, L. (1998). From Symphony to Jazz: The concept of strategy in education. School Leadership & Management, 18(4), 449–460. https://doi.org/10.1080/13632439869420
- Bellei, C., Vanni, X., Valenzuela, J. P., & Contreras, D. (2016). School improvement trajectories: An empirical typology. School Effectiveness and School Improvement, 27(3), 275–292. https://doi.org/10.1080/09243453.2015.1083038
- Carpenter, D. (2018). Intellectual and physical shared workspace: Professional learning communities and the collaborative culture. International Journal of Educational Management, 32(1), 121–140. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEM-05-2017-0104
- Carvalho, M, Cabral, I., Verdasca, J. & Alves, J. M. (2018a). Participation in strategic planning and action (PSPA). A validation study. Manuscript in preparation.
- Carvalho, M, Cabral, I., Verdasca, J. & Alves, J. M. (2018b). Strategic action processes for school improvement (SAPSI). A validation study. Manuscript in preparation.
- Cheng, E. C. K. (2011). An examination of the predictive relationships of self-evaluation capacity and staff competency on strategic planning in Hong Kong aided secondary schools. Educational Research for Policy and Practice, 10(3), 211–223.
- Cheung, F. & Cheng, Y. (2002). An outlier study of multilevel self-management and school performance. School Effectiveness & School Improvement, 13(3), 253-290. https://doi.org/10.1076/sesi.13.3.253.3428
