School Committee's Roles in Developing School

School Committee’s Engagement

School Committee (SC) has some different names depending on the context of preference use in each region. However, SC refers to a group of representatives (people) or an elected body who are officially elected to oversee and develop the school policy, curriculum, and shared decision and responsibilities in order to create effective environment of student learning as well as to build accountability and self-monitoring at individual school level. In relation to SBM, meaningful involvement of parents and community members in the education of their children can significantly increase student success rates. People in communities can become involved by participating in school committees, advisory committees and the board of trustees, or school site council (San Francisco Public Schools, 2014). The Alberta School Council Resource Manual 2006 and 2007 defines:

“School councils are collective associations of parents, teachers, secondary students, principals, staff, and community representative(s) who work together to effectively support and enhance student learning. They provide one means for members of the school community to provide advice and consult with the principal and to advise the board...”

In general, school site council/committee is defined as an elected group of teachers, parents, and classified employees who work with the site principal to develop, review, evaluate and allocate funds for school improvement programs at the school level (Murphy and Beck, 1998: 14).  School committee varies in composition and responsibilities; most writers agree that it is within a school committee that school stakeholders such as principals, teachers, parents, community members and students do participate in decision making. In this sense, the school site council or school committee is a form of community engagement in school governance, based on regulation, with elected but voluntary membership.                                         

In the practice of school-based management in Cambodia, the participatory decision making approach has been encouraged through the establishment of School Support Committee which has brought relevant key local stakeholders together. All schools have the School Support Committee which is composed of (1) a representative of local authorities at village or commune level or head of monk; (2) school principal; (3) one community representative who is admirable and charismatic; (4) one member of parent association; (5) one accountant (elected from among members); (6) one treasurer (elected from among members) and one secretary (elected from among members). The functions and roles of the committee include (1) enhancing the enrolment of children through education campaign and encouragement of parents; (2) taking part in revenue mobilization and budget through school development plan; (3) improving school maintenance and property; (4) involving in school construction and repair through fund raising and engaging parents; (5) preventing irregularities inside and outside the school; (6) participating in school planning and implementation and (7) monitoring student learning through community-parent meeting (The Asian Conference on Education 2012, Kheang Thida).

The extent to which the School Support Committee, parents and community members and nongovernmental organizations take part in school development characterizes the uniqueness of the participating schools. The school with active involvement of the School Support Committee, parents and the community as well as direct technical and financial assistance from various nongovernmental organizations proves better improvement in environment and infrastructure, instructional materials and staff involvement while the school with less or no direct support seems to have minimal improvement. The study indicates that in order to demand involvement and direct support from the organizations, strong school leadership is especially crucial as addressed by Grauwe (2005) that the principal capacity and leadership style is significantly related to quality of education and school improvement. He added that the principals engage the community in school activities and get them to understand the situation, constantly building trust.

In Indonesian, the government provided a set of guidelines to establish mandatory corporate governing body type school councils (SBM principles, Decree No. 044/U/2002 on the Education Board and School Committees) by defining the school committee as a community representative body at school level with members from parents, community leaders, education professionals, private sector, education associations, teachers, NGOs and village officials. Furthermore, the Education Act 20/2003 (art. 56) states that community shall take part in the quality improvement of educational services, which include planning, monitoring, and evaluation of educational programs through Educational Council and School Council/Committee (Journal of NTT Studies, 2009). The Decree also stressed the four major roles of school council, such as: (1) an advisory agency in determining and approving school policies, at the school level; (2) a supporting agency in supporting the school both in financial and non-financial matters; (3) a controlling agency for transparency and accountability at school level; and (4) a mediator between school, government, and community. Establishing school committee is one of the educational decentralization policies aiming at delegating power and authority from central government office to district authorities and schools in order to improve education quality. And it is also an effective means to promote democratic principle, community participation and equity as well as accommodation of the diverse local interests and needs (Indonesian Department of National Education, 2001: 26). 

According to a Handbook for School Site Council (California Department of Education, March 2006:2), the school site council/school committee shall be composed of principal and representatives of teachers selected by teachers at the school; other school personnel selected by school personnel at the school; parents of the students selected by parents; and students selected by students attending that school (secondary level). And at primary level, the school committee shall be constituted to ensure parity between (a) the principal, classroom teachers, and other school personnel; and (b) parents or other community members selected by parents. In schools with fewer than three teachers, this requirement may be met by establishing a school committee that is composed of equal numbers of school staff and parents or other community members selected by parents.

To Robert V. Antonucci (1995), the school committee’s roles are involved in these key areas: establish educational goals and policies for the schools in the district, consistent with the requirements of law and the statewide goals and standards established by the board of education; responsible for adopting general disciplinary policies for students in consultation with the superintendent; delegate to the superintendent and principal the authority to define detailed rules of student conduct; reviews and approves the budget for education programs; hold a public hearing on the proposed annual budget; determine school expenditures; adopt the professional development plan for principal, teachers and other professional. However, the school committee cannot make decision alone but with discussions or shared decisions with principal, teachers, parents, and community for effective education reform, including participatory decision-making, parent and community involvement, and training for members of school councils.               

In similarity to implementation of SMB in Indonesian context, the Triton Regional School (Massachusetts, USA 2013) and the Foxborough Public School (USA, 2008) stated that roles and responsibilities of school committee at school level has five major roles and responsibilities such as (1) policy making – the school committee is responsible for development of the school policy as guides for administrative action and for employing a superintendent who will implement its policies; (2) appraisal – the school committee is responsible for evaluating the effectiveness of its policies and their implementation; (3) provision of financial resources – the school committee is responsible for adoption of a budget that will enable the school system to carry out the committee's policies; (4) public relations – the school committee is responsible for providing adequate and direct means for keeping the local citizenry informed about the schools and for keeping itself and the school staff informed about the needs and wishes of the public; and (5) educational planning and evaluation – the committee is responsible for ensuring that educational objectives are set that promote continual improvement of the educational programs.

Written by Mut Somoeun (a part from the published thesis, M.Ed)