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Primary School
Management Development Project


G. Tsayang, P. Monyatsi, P. Bulawa and C. Mhozya
Faculty of Education, University of Botswana, Botswana

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ABSTRACT

Primary School Management Development Project intended to improve management of primary
schools in Botswana started in 1999 and ended in 2002. The Impact Evaluation Study (IES) conducted in 2000 found
that management practices introduced by the project had improved management by most SMTs. School Management
Teams and Primary School Management Advisors put in place by the Project were functioning well. Cluster and
school-based in service training had a positive impact on management of primary schools. The present study wanted
to find out whether the findings from the IES were sustained. A survey of 24 schools in four of the six national
education regions was conducted. The main findings of the study were that the program activities and structures were
sustained. The sustenance was attributed to the initial involvement of the key stakeholders in the conception of the
project through the base line study where school managers identified key management areas of need. The sustenance
is also attributed to political commitment by the government manifested through regularizing the project into a
Ministry of Education programme properly budgeting for. One of the implications of the findings is that commitment
by stakeholders should be grounded on a sound understanding and true involvement by the key players from conception
to implementation of any program. It is also noted that decentralization should not be abdication of accountability
by the mother body, the central government, instead, should be a strategy through which the central government
works to empower the policy and programme implementers.