5.1 Chapter 5: Summary of Key Takeaways

The Role of Management, Leadership, and Monitoring | 229

See table 5.1 for a review of key takeaways from this chapter.

Table 5.1 Chapter 5: Summary of Key Takeaways

Good management and leadership at the school level

• Administration. The ability to efficiently plan and manage the allocation of resources is crucial to quality ECE leadership and management because the majority of a school leader’s time is spent on these tasks. • Pedagogical leadership. Good leaders put learning at the center of leadership and help teachers adapt curriculum, use assessment appropriately, and support children’s transitions. Good leaders also understand systemwide challenges and local context and balance the two; they also support staff development. • Partnerships. Developing and fostering positive school and family partnerships is a key role for school leaders.

ECE management at the system level

• When selecting ECE leaders, formal training, skills, and qualifications should be combined with formative assessment. Continuous pragmatic training is essential to developing the core skills of ECE leaders. • To improve children’s learning, all ECE leaders, including leader-managers, need to take responsibility for staff development, such as supervising and assessing teacher performance, mentoring and planning teacher professional development, and cultivating a reflective and collaborative working culture (OECD 2015), in addition to attending to their own ongoing development and learning. • School-based management can be an effective approach to empowering school leaders and school communities.

Quality assurance for service delivery and data

• Quality assurance systems can help improve school management and ECE Service Delivery. • Quality assurance systems entail monitoring and accountability measures, including – Developing comprehensive and localizable standards; – Establishing an evaluation, support, and accountability system based on data; – Using data efficiently to promote compliance mechanisms and target support; and – Empowering and evaluating school committees.

Putting policies into practice

The crucial steps a country can take to improve the quality of its ECE leadership include the following: • Diagnose the current challenges and circumstances. • Plan for implementation to ensure political support for reforms, standards setting, evaluation, monitoring, quality assurance, and training in both management and educational leadership. • Monitor implementation to evaluate progress and improve services.

Source: Original table for this publication. Note: ECE = early childhood education.