The Influence of Community Partnership Benchmark on Management Outcomes in Child Friendly Schools of Makueni County, Kenya

Abstract

The Kenya government’s effort to adopt and implement the CFS model created a gap with some public primary schools becoming child friendly while others lagged behind. This paper reports a study on the influence of community partnership as a benchmark on themanagement outcome of child friendly schools. The study was conducted in Makueni County of Kenya in which Child friendly school partnership with Communities was significantly established. A population of about 45,102 was studied producing a sample of 402 respondents. In schools where community partnership existed, 63.6% have operational BOM committees, Parents provided funds for school projects and construction of buildings (58.1%), Parents participated in school’s decision-makingprocess (59.4%) and Parents met at least once every month to discuss school development (59.8%). However, other than parents, partnership with other stakeholders was not clear. The study recommended strengthened implementation of community partnership with child friendly schools for the benefit of children.