Thesis:

Principals’ management practices and its influence on implementation of strategic plans in public secondary schools in Mombasa county, Kenya

Since 2005, the Kenyan Ministry of Education requires all school heads to come up with strategic plans that detail resource allocation, plan of their schools and implementation of their strategic plans. However, recent reports from the Ministry of Education show that management of public secondary schools face a number of challenges seemingly pointing at strategic planning. The purpose of the study was to determine the principals’ management practices on implementation of strategic plans in public secondary schools in Mombasa County. The objectives of the study were to; determine the scope to which principals involve parents in planning for infrastructure while implementing strategic plans in public secondary ; establish the extent to which principals involve teachers in planning school programs while implementing strategic plans Mombasa County, determine the extent to which principals involve students in resource allocation while implementing strategic plans in public secondary schools in Mombasa County, and establish the extent to which principals involve non-teaching staff in planning of school programs while implementing strategic plans in public secondary schools in Mombasa county. The study was based on Gaber’s 2006 strategic model Capital. The study employed a descriptive survey research design and targeted a total of 13 out of the 40 public secondary schools in Mombasa County from which a sample of 392 respondents comprising 15 Principals, 75 teachers, 210 students and 75 non-teaching staff. Purposive sampling was used to select principals as they are the custodians of strategic planning and represent the Board of Management. and students from their group was chosen using simple random method. The stratified sampling method was used to sample a total of 392 respondents who included principals, teachers, students and non-teaching staff. The researcher used a self-designed questionnaire on teachers and on-teaching staff, and interview schedule on principals to gather qualitative data. The collected data was analysed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) computer program version 24.0. Data analysis involved descriptive statistics inform of frequencies and percentages. The inferential statistics that were used to compute the relationships between variables used Pearson product moment correlation coefficient. The analysed data was presented in form of tables and graphs. Thematic analysis of data obtained from the interviews was used and presented in summarised narration. The findings of the study were useful to Principals and BOM as they were able to understand management practices that can facilitate implementation of strategic plans in their schools. The Ministry of Education harnessed the study findings to take appropriate measures relating to school management practices to ensure the proper implementation of the set strategic plans by various schools. found that the in disagreement with statements related to principals’ involvement of parents in planning for school infrastructure. Results showed that teachers were close to being neutral about the statements associated with the principal’s involvement of teachers in planning school programs. The findings show that individual statements, the teachers rated variedly with the school’s principal always involving students when allocating time. The study found that the level of invo in various aspects of school management is fall within a moderate level. The study concludes that about 71.7% variations in the strategic planning were attributed to involvement of parents, teachers, students and non-teaching staff. The study recommends that the Cabinet Secretary Education should review the school management policy and statutory to meet the current needs for parental involvement in strategic planning of principals. Moreover, the public secondary school principals should design mechanism for inclusive strategic planning where everyone is taken care of.