The South African school principal of the future will have a special qualification in school management to prepare him/her for the job.
The position will come with special conditions of service that mean if he/she does not perform, he/she can be removed from the position by the Department of Education.
These are initiatives that are part the department’s plan to professionalise principalship and reclaim the status once attached to the position.
‘A principal should not see himself/herself as another kind of educator. Principalship is not a glorified teaching job,” said Martin Prew, director of the Department of Education’s directorate: education management and governance development.
Strong school management and leadership are internationally proven ingredients for successful schools. This is why the department is pursuing them as tools to improve the quality of learning and teaching in schools.
‘School management is not an end in itself,” said Prew. ‘School management is about the delivery of the curriculum and the delivery of good learning and teaching. The department wants to get to a point where principals will ask: ‘How does management enhance learning and teaching in my school’”
Earlier this year the top decision-making bodies in education, the Council of Education Ministers (CEM) and the Heads of Education Departments Committee (Hedcom), noted the department’s education management and leadership development policy, which serves as the outline for the department’s current efforts.
The South African Standard for Principalship is based on the policy, while the South African National Professional Qualification for Principals and related education management qualifications are rooted in the standard.
Said Prew: ‘If you don’t have a policy, it is impossible to take the rest of your initiatives forward coherently.”
The South African Standard for Principalship clearly defines what the department expects from principals, what principals can expect from the education system, what educational and social values they are expected to espouse and the skills and personal attributes they should develop, so they can be effective in running 21st century schools in the South African context.
The offshoot from the standard, a first South African National Professional Qualification for Principals, will be a university-level qualification that will be rolled out nationally in 2009 to ensure that those who head up schools are prepared.
Up to 3 000 school principals — more than 10% of the total number — will participate in the development of the qualification. The first intake of 1 000 principals should be enrolled early next year.
The participants will be selected jointly by the national and provincial department of education and higher education institutions to participate in the two-year programme costing R9 000 to R11 000 a person per year. Issues of gender equity and transformation will be guidelines in the selection process.
Those principals who drop out will have to repay the money the government spent on them and those who fail will get an opportunity to fix their shortcomings.
The qualification will be part of a range of qualifications at different levels that will link together the standards of management in education.
Prew said a literature survey showed that South Africa’s iniative was setting the tone internationally.
‘South Africa is the first country that has linked an entry level qualification for principals rooted in standards that are rooted in a policy. It is the first country to establish that logical link. Other countries may have policies, for example, but no standards. Alternatively they may have standards, but not a qualification.”