Educational Leadership and Quality Education in Disadvantaged Communities in Ghana and Tanzania
Contributor Name:
Sudakshina Mallick
Achieving quality in education is crucial in strategic improvement plans of developing countries and the implementation of education for all initiatives.
The authors seek to examine country context perspectives of quality education and leadership challenges associated with the implementation. They compare existing basic education quality improvement policy initiatives within Ghana and Tanzania. Findings for both countries indicate that:
- Governments need to pursue strategies for enhancing quality at the basic educational level;
- There is a need to define quality indicators that will meet developmental needs as well as fit into global indicators;
- Quality indicators should move beyond government inputs such as infrastructure, teachers and materials;
- Greater attention should be given to teaching and learning time utilization;
- Policy makers should recognize that providing expanded access does not guarantee quality in education;
- Leadership at classroom and school levels is important for ensuring effective utilization of human and material resources and school time;
- Head teachers need to be empowered to provide leadership;
- Women are under-represented in school leadership.