The Place and Importance of School Management in Education System

The efficiency of the education system and the school are connected to each other with a cause-and-effect chain. Since the efficiency of the system comes from the school, school management and administrators have a great impact on the success of the system.

In this article, I examine the place and importance of school management in the education system, the issues to be considered in school management and the qualifications of school administrators. Thus, I present an important educational problem and solution suggestions to the attention of those responsible.

What is Education Management and School Management?

Organisation and management are intertwined. Because the task of management is to keep the organisation alive according to its objectives. The source of managerial behaviour is the organisational environment and the value system of the manager should be consistent with the values of the organisation. In this context, management is a means, not an end.

Like organisation and management, education system and education management are two concepts that are interdependent and intertwined in terms of purpose and means. The concepts of education system and education management are related to the whole of education.

The state has established the education system to enable citizens to exercise their right to education and to facilitate its own duties. Educational management, on the other hand, is the process of operating, developing and renewing the educational organisation established to meet the educational needs of the society in order to achieve its predetermined objectives. In other words, educational management is a branch of science that examines the most effective and efficient use of people, money, tools and equipment in order for educational institutions and schools to achieve their goals. In fact, educational administration consists of the application of management to education and is a branch of management science.

In an education system, just as the school is a sub-system, school management is in the same situation compared to educational management. Just as educational administration is the application of administration to education, school administration is the application of educational administration to school. The centre of gravity of educational administration is on school administration. If it is necessary to determine the distinction between educational administration and school administration within the organisational structure, it is possible to evaluate the Ministry of National Education, central and provincial organisations other than schools within the scope of educational administration. School management is a branch of science that examines the principles, methods and techniques related to the most effective and efficient operation of schools or schools according to educational objectives.

What is the System Characteristic of a School?

A system is a whole consisting of elements that affect each other regularly and rely on each other. School is a system. The system approach to the school enables the problems of the school to be understood with a holistic approach together with all the elements related to it. System thinking is a discipline of seeing the whole.

Below, the system characteristic of the school is explained by integrating the elements of the system:

- Input: The school sustains its life by receiving inputs from its environment. The inputs that the school receives from its environment are students, educational staff, educational tools and equipment, consumption inputs required for education and educational technology. In fact, the aims of education can also be seen as a school input.

- Processing (Process): Processing refers to the production process of the system. The school educates its students by using other inputs. In other words, education is a process.

- Output: The output of the system is its product. The product of the school is the students who acquire new behaviours in line with the educational objectives. The school also produces publications, educational activities and new ideas in the field of education.

- Transformation of Output into Input: In order for a system to survive, its output must return to the system. The money that the school will receive as a result of selling its product returns to itself in direct and indirect ways.

- Necessity of Increasing Input: The system has to receive more input each time than the previous one. This is because the system gradually loses power throughout its operation. The school tries to minimise the loss of power (entropy) by receiving more input each year than the previous year.

- Feedback: In order to survive, a system needs to recognise defects in its production process and products immediately. The school cannot create the necessary environment for education unless it eliminates the errors that occur during the education of students. School management should be able to collect feedbacks during the operation of the school in order to eliminate these errors and defects.

The school management should also monitor the students who graduate from the school and should know the problems they face and should be able to put the knowledge, skills and attitudes that will help to solve these problems into the school programmes.

- Selection: The system closes its door to the inputs that are not necessary for it and selects the inputs that are necessary for it. The school also selects its students, educational staff and educational tools and equipment. The selection process is compulsory to improve the quality of education in the school.

- Balancing, Stability Cycle: Equilibration is the struggle to get rid of the difficulties and crisis that the organisation falls into while solving the problems arising from the external and internal environment. Stability, on the other hand, is the comfortable situation provided by solving the problems. The school also faces problems as a system. School management tries to keep the school in a state of equilibrium as much as possible by solving these problems.

- Environment: Every system lives in an environment. If the environment of the system is favourable, the system can survive. The school can also survive when its environment is favourable. The environment of the school is the other organisations from which it receives inputs, to which it sends its graduates, which affect it and which are affected by it, and the society.

Why is school management important?

The education system tries to integrate the schools established to meet the educational needs of the society and to realise the educational objectives prepared by the state. The school is the basic system of the education system that produces education. In the education system, higher systems (Central Organisation of the Ministry, Interuniversity Council, Higher Education Council) produce administrative decisions. Intermediary higher systems (Provincial and District Directorates of National Education, University Rectorate) transmit these decisions to the basic systems (schools). However, schools (universities, faculties, institutes, high schools, secondary schools, primary schools, kindergartens) are the main basic systems that produce education.

The place and importance of the organisation called school in the education system is that it is the most strategic part of the system and the primary means of evaluating education. This characteristic of the school stems from the fact that the school is a social organisation that is most open to the public and has the most relations with the public.

The school is the dependent variable of educational administration in terms of its organisation and functioning. It is the educational administrators who determine the educational policies and plans at the top level and interpret them at the middle level. However, it is the school administrators at the first level who realise the implementation of all these and ensure the feedback of the system. In this context, the efficiency of the education system and the school are connected to each other with a cause-and-effect chain. Since the efficiency of the system comes from the school, school management and administrators have a great impact on the success of the system.

Since the relationship between the school and the Central Organisation of the Ministry is in a way similar to the relationship between the organisation and the management, the duty and responsibility of the Ministry should be to keep the schools alive in accordance with their aims. It is also the duty of the school administration to keep the school alive in accordance with its educational objectives. School administrators are primarily responsible for the survival and development of schools. In a democratic society and structure, school administrators have to accept and realise this responsibility.

What are the issues that school administrators should pay attention to?

The school administrator, who is responsible for the management of the school, provides and directs human and material resources appropriately. The school administrator has to think and prioritise the school first and foremost in his/her behaviour and work. The school administrator, who will keep the school alive in accordance with its purpose, should consider the following issues and do the following things:

- School administrators should be aware of the fact that the school is established to educate students as good citizens and should try to realise the school goals.

- As an educational leader, the school administrator should ensure the co-operation of all forces that will contribute to the success and development of the school administrator.

- While managing the school, the provisions of the laws, by-laws and regulations in force and the traditions and rules adopted in the region should be followed.

- Necessary information about parents and students should be provided, used for the development of the school and students, and the principles of confidentiality should be respected.

- Information about students should not be given to anyone outside the school, other than organisations and individuals working in the school and working for the welfare of the students.

- School management should observe the success of the employees, should not attribute it to themselves, should make the evaluation objectively and gain trust.

- School management should observe the success of the employees, should not attribute it to themselves, should make the evaluation objectively and gain trust.

- Care should be taken against those who want to use the school for their personal interests and the school should be protected.

- All kinds of applications should be carefully examined and actions that are in the interest of the school and the individual should be taken in a timely and appropriate manner.

- Things and behaviours that will provide personal benefit should be avoided.

- Care should be taken to ensure that the school's money and other resources are spent without being wasteful, and accounts and records should be kept and controlled completely.

Which qualities should contemporary school administrators have?

In order to democratise education administration, there is a need for competent school administrators who adopt democratic thinking and behaviour, live democracy and make it live in their schools. In order to overcome the inadequacies in the structure and functioning of the education system, the existence of competent school administrators is mandatory. In order to use the school as the first point of departure in solving the problems of the education system, the competence of school administrators is seen as a concrete and valid approach.

The role of modern school administrators will be high in ensuring a bright future. A contemporary school administrator is an administrator who has a comprehensive knowledge of human beings, has effective communication skills, has dominant leadership qualities, can use his/her mother tongue correctly and beautifully, is educated in philosophy, mathematics and history of civilisation, knows foreign languages and communication technology, manages information, is physically and mentally healthy and believes in education.

The modern school administrator is democratic. A democratic school administrator should have the following qualities

- Co-operates with the staff around him/her.

- He/she gives importance and value to the people he/she works with in order for the school to reach its aim, takes care of their official and private problems, and does not hesitate to help them to the best of his/her ability.

- Creates an environment enabling criticism of the work done. He/she ensures the participation of the staff in decision-making and receives opinions and suggestions from them.

Conclusion

- The impact of events or phenomena in the school environment depends on the school administrator's ability to perceive the school as a system. In order to perceive and analyse their schools as a system, school administrators should perceive, explain and interpret the purpose of the school as a primary and important element.

- According to a study conducted on the Turkish Education System, education administrators reported that the education system does not show most of the system characteristics sometimes, some of them always, and some of them never. Educational administration is a branch of science. It is a common situation in our country that people who are not educated in this discipline are appointed as educational administrators. The source of many problems in educational institutions is that educational administrators do not have appropriate merit.

- The most strategic parts of education are students, teachers and school administrators. Even if the quality of students and teachers is very good, if the school administrator does not have the necessary merit, the efficiency and aims of education will be jeopardised. A school administrator who is chosen as a political supporter or to realise the aims of a group instead of the aims of education is a major problem for the future of the country.

- School management is embodied by the team consisting of the school principal and vice principals. Each school administrator is required to run the school functioning in the direction of efficiency.

- Since schools are human-oriented organisations, they may be more difficult to manage and develop than other organisations. In order to overcome these difficulties and to create a quality school environment, school administrators have great duties and therefore school administrators need to improve themselves continuously.

- In order for schools to function at the desired level, school administrators should be individuals who are sensitive to the needs and problems of the society, who are innovative, who have democratic values, and who can establish a team spirit with teachers.

Suggestions

Consideration of the following suggestions, which are also supported by the researches within the scope of the examination and the results obtained, will make significant contributions to the education system.

- Steps should be taken towards the professionalisation of educational administration by establishing units with the function of administrator academy within MoNE and provincial organisations; it should be ensured that current educational administrators undergo master's degree education with/without thesis in educational administration.

- The appointment of educational administrators based on examination and merit should be taken as a basis and practices including standards should be developed in this regard. Priority should be given to the selection of school administrators, especially among graduates of educational administration discipline.

- In the process of being appointed as school administrators, it should be a necessity for the administrator candidates to have practice as well as theoretical education. It should be ensured that school administrators work as teachers and deputy principals for a certain period of time and also do internship with senior administrators.

- School administrators should receive regular trainings on legislation.

- Hierarchical barriers in correspondence and communication should be removed and practices that support school and administrator autonomy should be included so that school administrators can make direct correspondence.

- School administrators should be paid a meaningful level of management compensation and financial policies that incentivise them to become administrators should be developed.

- Easy and accessible communication channels should be established between school administrators and higher institutions, and higher institutions should be in constant co-operation with school administrators in solving the problems that reach them.

- It is very important that teachers are taken into consideration in schools. Teachers are the most important element that determines the success and management style of school administration with their practices and ideas. An idea that teachers do not believe in and support is very unlikely to be successful.

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