Teach Middle East Magazine Jan - Mar 2020 Issue 2 Volume 7 | Page 33

Sharing Good Practice
where teachers participate in decision
making, commit to the improvement,
and take collective responsibility
towards their learning and students'
outcomes (Harris, 2001). Nonetheless,
the major challenge facing schools is
not how to improve, but how to sustain
improvement (Harris & Lambert, 2003),
and that cannot be done when there
are key people in positions of power
favouring the old style (Mertkan-
Ozunlu & Thomson, 2009).
School capacity building includes
activities such as redesigning initial
teacher
education,
preparing
teachers and principals for change,
and creating professional learning
communities inside and outside
the school (Fullan, 2000). Many
studies, such as those conducted
by Ortiz and Taylor (2009); Dinham
and Crowther (2011); and Anderson
and Kumari (2009); suggested that
building school capacity is essential
to support the implementation of
school improvement initiatives and to
sustain progress. Indeed it has been
argued that sustainability will only
occur when school development is the
ultimate requirement, initiatives are
implemented to develop its practices
internally and there is both complete
support and challenge externally
(Fullan, 2000).
Sustainability in school improvement
will also occur where the improvement
fosters learning, is shared by all
stakeholders and it is supported by
sufficient resources (Hargreaves &
Fink, 2003), and effective leadership.
Dinham and Crowther (2011) suggest
following a distributed leadership
approach and identifying three
categories of elements necessary for
effective capacity building: Firstly, the
tangible features such as teachers,
school, students, school infrastructure
and finance; secondly intangible
features such as school environment,
professional development, teaching
and learning methods, and leadership
and management; and thirdly, the
support the school gets from Ministries
of Education and government, which
depends on the value placed on
education by the decision makers.
In
summary,
successful
school
capacity building is achieved through
developing
professional
teaching
and learning methods, good use
of all factors affecting learning and
establishing
professional
learning
communities
to
sustain
school
improvement and ensure learners
maximise their potential as reflected
in assessment outcomes. Many writers
in the field, such as Scheerens et al.,
(2013) and Dinham (2005), indicated
that involvement of stakeholders,
the sharing of vision, mission, values,
commitment, and the establishment
of a learning community are vital
factors in educational leadership
effectiveness, to achieve better school
outcomes.
References
Anderson, S., & Kumari, R. (2009). Continuous
Improvement in Schools: Understanding the
Practice. International Journal of Educational
Development, 29(3), 281–292.
Australian Research Institute in Education
for Sustainability. (2009). Education For
Sustainability: The Role of Education in
Engaging and Equipping People for Change.
Administration, 49(6), 616–623.
Fullan, M. (1985). Change Processes and
Strategies at the Local Level. The Elementary
School Journal, 85(3), 391–421.
Fullan, M. (2000). The Three Stories of Education
Reform. The Phi Delta Kappan, 81(8), 581–584.
Hargreaves, A., & Fink, D. (2003). Sustaining
Leadership. The Phi Delta Kappan, 84(9), 693–
700.
Harris, A. (2001). Building the Capacity for
School Improvement. School Leadership &
Management, 21(3), 261–270.
Harris, A., & Lambert, L. (2003). Building
Leadership Capacity for School Improvement.
England: McGraw-Hill Education.
Mertkan-Ozunlu, S., & Thomson, P. (2009).
Educational Reform in North Cyprus—Towards
the Making of a Nation/State? International
Journal of Educational Development, 29(1), 99–
106.
Muijs, D., Harris, A., Chapman, C., & Russ, J.
(2010). Improving Schools in Socioeconomically
Disadvantaged Areas – A Review of
Research Evidence Improving Schools in
Socioeconomically Disadvantaged. (December
2011), 37–41.
Crowther, F. (2011). From School Improvement
to Sustained Capacity: The Parallel Leadership
Pathway. California: Corwin Press. Novick, B., Kress, J. S., & Elias, M. J. (2002).
Building Learning Communities with Character
How to Integrate Ccademic, Social, and
Emotional Learning. Alexandria, Va.: Association
for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Dinham, S. (2005). Principal Leadership for
Outstanding Educational Outcomes. Journal of
Educational Administration, 43(4), 338–356. Ortiz, A., & Taylor, P. (2009). Learning Purposefully
in Capacity Development Why, What and When
to Measure? Paris.
Dinham, S., & Crowther, F. (2011). Sustainable
School Capacity Building – One Step Back,
Two Steps Forward? Journal of Educational Scheerens, J., Witziers, B., & Steen, R. (2013). A
Meta-analysis of School Effectiveness Studies.
Revista de Educacion, 2013(361), 619–645.
Dr. Ahmed A.Karim, an international consultant in the quality of education, and
the founder & the Chief Executive Officer in Quality House Consultancy, is an
internationally renowned consultant in school quality improvement towards
excellence in education. He is one of the first to have contributed to the establishment
of the School Review Unit in Quality Authority for Qualifications and Quality
Assurance of Education and Training (QQA), where he was the Lead Reviewer.
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