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STAFF DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMMES AND TEACHERS EFFECTIVENESS IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background to the Study

Globally, educating a nation remains the most vital strategy for the development of the society throughout the developing world. Many studies on human capital development concur that it is the human resources of a nation and not its capital or natural resources that ultimately determine the pace of its economic and social development. The principal institutional mechanism for developing human capital is the formal education system of primary, secondary, and tertiary training (Nsubuga, 2003). Since education is an investment, there is a significant positive correlation between education and socio-economic productivity.

Staff development programme is a process designed to improve job understanding, promote more effective job performance, and establish future goals for career growth. It helps staff in understanding their responsibilities. It is the opportunities available to new and experienced teachers and teaching assistants {paraprofessionals}. These activities are designed to improve the quality of classroom instruction; enable individuals to grow professionally; introduce practitioners to the practical applications of research-validated strategies; and help teachers meet their license and salary differentials.

Staff development programmes can also be referred to as the processes, and activities through which every organization develops, enhances and improves the skills, competencies and overall performance of its employees and workers. It was found by a researcher that head teachers were well trained as teachers, but not as school managers. The training given to head teachers when training as teachers is inadequate to prepare them for leadership roles. As observed by Kyeyune (2008), there is a gap in leadership training to prepare head teachers for their roles. Given the education reforms and the many challenges, which come with the reforms, educational leadership is increasingly becoming a big concern. Secondary schools today are faced with challenges that emphasize the demand for effective leadership.

Such head teachers do not just require training in general education administration, but specialized training which is capable of imparting the necessary management and leadership skills. It is clear from past studies that the head teachers are not able to improve school performance unless they are equipped with certain knowledge, intellectual, social and psychological skills.

It was discovered that head teachers do not receive induction on appointment. There is therefore a need for a continuous professional development programme for the academic staff such as the school principals, vice principals, head teachers and subject teachers. For example: head teachers play many roles and for them to fit the profile of principals that Kyeyune, (2008), describes as change agents, they must not only manage but lead. For any reform to succeed, head teachers, as gatekeepers, must be up to the task and hence the need for continuous professional development in order to promote teachers effectiveness in class. Several studies had proffered solution to a review of the curriculum for the training of teachers so that sufficient attention is given to management and leadership skills. The need to review the training curriculum is precipitated by the existing gap between theory and practice. Through practice and observation of schools the researcher established that some head teachers who made efforts to accumulate qualifications and certificates, had no significant improvement registered at the schools they were heading. This implies that either the knowledge acquired was not relevant to the situation on ground or there was a failure to translate the theoretical knowledge into practice. All the teachers are potential leaders (future head teachers). Ministries of Education and the universities in liaison with the teacher training colleges should therefore undertake the review of the said curricula.

It has also been observed that universities which train teachers and head teachers, for that matter are detached from the schools which are the point for delivery of the services of the products from the universities and training colleges. The training institutions cannot abrogate their responsibilities when their products are found wanting and cannot deliver quality work. For Kajubi (1992) however, he submitted that “the quality of the education system cannot be better than the quality of its teachers”.

Mkpa (2002) suggested innovations in the in-service programmes in Nigeria to include:

1.      Mentoring: This is a strategy in which highly experienced teachers in a school are assigned a number of less-experienced ones to serve as their mentors or professional guides. This is like the Peer In-Service Approach (PISA) which is a self-help in-service approach that drastically reduces the cost of financingtraining programmes for teachers within local government areas; thus, the services of good/experienced teachers is utilized to up-date other teachers in neighbouring schools in the same area (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation UNESCO, 1997:30-31).

2.      Peer-Tutoring: In this, a colleague approaches the other to obtain or seek professional assistance or guide on any aspect of his/her discipline where he/she is defective. In this way, the area of professional competence of each colleague benefits the other eventually leading to each member of staff growing academically and professionally.

3.      Subject Lead-Teacher Approach: A Senior Teacher of the same subject leads the other teachers, overseeing all curricular programmes associated with that subject.

4.      Cluster Lead-Teachers Approach: Teachers in selected schools in a Local Government Area (five or less schools) come together to share experiences in

 certain subjects. A very good teacher in a particular subject leads the others. This cluster enhances mutual assistance among them, hence self-improvement without necessarily going to any training institution.

 In addition to the above strategies, the different subject-teacher and discipline associations‟ conferences, workshops, and seminars should be encouraged on local government, state and national bases. Usually, at these gatherings experts should be invited to give talks after which the topics can then be elaborately discussed by all members.

The next characteristic is horizontal integration, which means linking education and life. Teachers and student teachers need to be made aware that much education takes place in the society outside the formal sub-system. This awareness will enable teachers integrate or link up the school education with that of the out-of school. This integration involves bringing the society into the school and also bringing the school into the society. For instance, relevant resources in the society should be brought into the school to bring more reality and boost classroom teaching. Workshops, arts galleries, agricultural establishments and industrial set-ups in the society should be used to interact with the formal school teaching. Students‟ practical teaching exercises should not be restricted to the formal classrooms, but should be extended to the out-of-school settings. Thus, the teachers will link school education with life in the broader society.

The third characteristic is pre-requisites for learning. This refers to having the disposition to continuing to learn or learning-how-to learn so as to enable one to be an autonomous learner. Aghenta (1992) recommended the Nigerian Teachers Institute (NTI) model of distance education with the students reporting to their teachers every weekend.

Emphasis should be placed on the use of the library and news media (print and electronic) to acquire knowledge. Continuous assessment and self-assessment should be stressed so as to enable students monitor their achievements while undertaking independent educational pursuits.

Teachers are expected to play new roles as part of the systemic reform efforts. Teacher professional development needs to provide opportunities for teachers to explore new roles, develop new instructional techniques, refine their practice and broaden themselves both as educators and as individuals. It is important that educators, parents, policy makers and the general public should understand the new expectations of teachers, the new roles and responsibilities, and current definitions of professional development. Recognition by the entire community of the complex nature of the changes needed is the first step in building the necessary support to ensure that teachers can fulfil their crucial role in systemic reform.

However, schools are bureaucratic, and hierarchical; teachers are isolated from one another and have learned to work alone; principals usually have not been asked to support teamwork; leadership has been linked only to formal roles. Professional development (PD) has relied upon a deficit model in which an expert imparts knowledge and information to teachers who are assumed to be deficient and who need outside experts to teach them new modes of working with students. PD requires systemic reforms, changing both structures of schools and the norms and practices within them. According to Fullan (2001), the change process involves four levels, namely active initiation and participation, pressure and support, changes in behaviour and beliefs, and ownership. Without understanding the complex nature of the changes required, and without creating professional development opportunities for teachers and others, school communities can end up adopting innovation after innovation without seeing any permanent improvement in the achievement of school goals. The design, implementation, and evaluation of professional development must therefore ensure attention is given to all phases of the change process. Reform efforts that do not focus on teacher acceptance may fail. Therefore, staff development programme must shift its emphasis from working on teachers to working with teachers toward improvement of teaching and learning for all students.

In the context of Nigeria, teacher professional development refers to the processes, organizational mechanisms and practices that are aimed at providing support to the teacher for the improvement and smooth discharge of his/her duties. Organizational mechanisms are the mechanisms for monitoring continuous development of the teacher. These may take the form of planned and scheduled short term training programmes and seminars aimed at meeting various professional needs of the teaching force. Practices, on the other hand, include the formal mentoring programmes developed in situations like e.g. advice that the teacher gets from the head teacher, ward education officer. Other forms of practice are the meetings held at school level and at cluster level with the purpose of reviewing and reflecting on practice on a regular basis. Establishment and effective utilization of Teachers Resource Centre is an important element in the professional development of teachers. This fact is supported by scholars such as Kruse and Luis (1997) as well as Quinn and Restine (1996) who argued for an interactive, on-the job coaching and mentoring approach to teacher professional development because it is cost effective.

Training can be organized in small school clusters and qualified senior teachers or university lecturers are invited to these clusters to serve as trainers and mentors. Such formal arrangements for professional development need to be supported by informal practices like team teaching and the sharing of experiences and educational resources among teachers, which greatly contribute to self- improvement. This approach has the advantage of stimulating healthy debates about various reform measures and innovations and encouraging collaboration, peer coaching, inquiry, collegial study groups, reflective discussion and action (Pounder, 1999).

Using the Interactive systems model, teacher professional development is a function of the interaction between and among five key players or stakeholders. These are the ministry responsible for teacher education, universities, schools, the community and the teachers themselves. The Ministry of Education and Vocational Training is responsible for providing policy and financial support for teacher professional development. Universities and Teacher Education colleges are responsible for providing training, conducting policy oriented research and providing relevant literature and materials to support teachers in schools. School management on its part is supposed to provide support to the teacher on a daily basis through advice, supervision, monitoring and evaluation of the teaching and learning activities. The community through the school committee is responsible for supporting teacher professional development by providing the necessary resources in the budget. The teacher is responsible for being proactive in seeking for opportunities for his or her own professional development.

The Rogan and Grayson (2003) model of professional development, suggested that programmes for upgrading of teachers from one grade to another do not qualify as teacher professional development. However, elements of professional development exemplified by the formal practices and informal practices initiated by teachers and their head teachers at school/ward level were noted which need to be nurtured and supported by all education stakeholders.

The aim of staff development programmes is to keep the staff up-to-date on the latest development in their fields, and enable them “brush up” their skills. It is the most effective training available to middle-level and top executives in the country. The purpose is to allow a member of staff supplement his/her basic knowledge and allow for an improved performance in the ways services are delivered. It is gratifying to note that the Federal and State governments of Nigeria are aware of the immense benefits derivable from staff development programmes.

In Nigeria for instance, there are such institutions as:

1.      The Centre for Management Development

2.      The Nigerian Institute of Management

3.      National Institute for Strategic and Policy Studies, Kuru, Jos

4.      Administrative Staff College of Nigeria (ASCON).

Hence, any staff development programme should be able to motivate, and help

improve the role perception of staff and also develop a proper attitude in them toward the public. It is clear that the need for adequate staff development programmes for teachers Nigeria has become obvious since two decades when they are getting conscious of it.

When teachers are educated, their standards of living are likely to improve, since they are empowered to access productive ventures, which will ultimately lead to an improvement in their livelihoods. The role of education therefore, is not just to impart knowledge and skills that enable the beneficiaries to function as economy and social change agents in the society, but also to impart values, ideas, attitudes and aspirations important for natural development.

The straightforward linkage between education and staff development programmes is therefore the improvement of labour skills, which in turn increases opportunities for well-paid productive employment. This then might enable the citizens of any nation to fully exploit their potential positively.

Thus, this study becomes important to address key issues such as staff/teachers development programmes in Nigeria context, to know how effective it is, how it has been affecting the service delivery of teachers and the positive impact this can have on the academic performance of secondary school students in Nigeria.

Statement of the Problem

The effect of staff development programmes on the job performance of teachers is worth investigating when one looks at the overview in the background of this study. Thus, if in-service training fails and do not succeed, Nigeria may experience set back in her social and economic development. Indeed, there is an urgent and desperate need for the organization of efficient and effective staff development programmes in Nigeria. The caliber of many teachers working in the public and private secondary schools in Nigeria is nothing to write home about. They are usually inefficient in the performance of their duties.

Many schools that organize staff training programmes in the country do have a wrong nomenclature that staff development programmes require placing few people with high potentials in a training programme while ignoring the rest of the staff. It is of course difficult to identify the potential of prospective teachers, but to rely on a few trainees is also risky. It is even more risky when the trainees are selected on the basis of friendship or kinship with executives without regard for capabilities. Apart from this, the academic performance of secondary school students has also being disappointing. Many students who enroll for West African Examination Council (WAEC) and National Examination Council (NECO) respectively in Nigerian secondary schools do perform woefully. Hence, it has been discovered that lack of efficient and skillful teachers have been the reasons behind this sordid performance.

This study is however imperative in order to determine the impact of staff/in-service development programmes on teachers effectiveness in the classrooms and how this can affect the academic performance of students in the secondary schools in Nigeria.

Study Objectives

The following objectives will be discussed in order to tackle the identified problems above. They are as follows:

1.      To investigate the impact of in-service training programmes on student‟s academic performance.

2.      To examine effect of full-time and part-time training programmes on teachers‟ teaching methods in the classrooms.

3.      To determine the various modes of training programmes (full-time and part-time) adopted by the secondary schools in Ibadan South East Local Government Area of Oyo State in training their teachers.

4.      To examine the impact of in-service training programmes on teachers‟ teaching methods in the classrooms.

Research Questions

1.      What is the impact of in-service training programmes on students‟ academic performance?

2.      What is the impact of in-service training programmes on the teachers teaching methods in the classrooms?

3.      What effects do the various modes of training programmes (full-time and par-time) have on teachers‟ teaching methods in the classrooms?

Hypotheses

For the purpose of this study, these assumptions can be established:

H01.There is no significant relationship between in-service training programmes and their contribution to students‟ academic performance.

H12. There is significant relationship between the modes of training (full-time and par-time) and teachers‟ teaching methods in the classrooms.

H13. There is significant relationship between in-service training programmes and teacher‟s teaching methods in the classrooms.

Scope of the Study

This study investigated the impact of staff development programmes on the effectiveness of secondary school teachers in Ibadan South East Local Government Area of Oyo State.

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