Stakeholders Perceptions On School Quality Assurance In Public Secondary Schools In Tanzania: A Case Of Mbulu Rural District Council

ABSTRACT

The study investigated stakeholders‟ perceptions in School Quality Assurance (SQA) in public secondary schools in Tanzania. The study was guided by three specific objectives including, perceived changes resulted from SQAs; perceived contributions of stakeholders and constraints faced by SQAs in performing their duties. The methodology employed in the study was qualitative whereby multiple case study design was used. The study was conducted in Mbulu rural District. The target population were 25 teachers, 5 parents, 6 SQAs, 5 school board chairpersons, 5 heads of schools and 1 DEO. Methods of data collection were semi structured interview, observation and documentary review. Results revealed that SQAs visits increases students‟ academic performance; improve teaching documents; leads to improvement of schools‟ administration and helped to control truancy among students. Also, the findings revealed that stakeholders play part in building of infrastructure and provision of furniture; enhance teachers‟ awareness and teachers‟ professional development; improve classroom lesson presentation; makes follow-up on students‟ progress and also they provide meals and funds for students. Furthermore, the study found that SQAs are facing the problems such as financial constraints; negligence on SQAs recommendations and inadequate number of science teachers. The study concluded that SQAs play a big role and they have the significant effects in attainment of quality education in public secondary schools; all stakeholders have shown the necessity of providing various contributions to schools in order to attain quality education. Additionally, there were constraints such as funds which hamper SQAs to perform their duties. Among others, the study recommended that efforts should be made by the government to provide sufficient funds to facilitate frequent inspection and to speed up the provision of feedback report to stakeholders.