Abstract
School-community partnerships play a critical part in successful schools, frequently providing support and resources to meet staff- and learner needs that go beyond the school’s walls. Therefore, schools are inseparably part of the communities they serve and can be more successful and productive working with community organisations than if functioning separately. The purpose of the study is to explore school management practices in establishing and maintaining school-community partnerships and to further analyse the use of school-community partnerships by school management teams and community partners as an improvement strategy in striving for quality education in township secondary schools in the Johannesburg Central District. The study employs a concurrent triangulation mixed methods design (QUAN + QUAL) to investigate the partnerships between 100 school management team (SMT) members from 16 selected township secondary schools and their respective community partners to better comprehend each participant‘s views and lived experiences of the partnerships. The systems theory, partnership theory, highly effective community schools model and Tuckman’s collaborative development model function as theoretical frameworks to understand how school management practices are implemented.
Quantitative results and qualitative findings found that the majority of participants had a positive understanding of how SMT members establish and maintain school-community partnerships. Participants expressed positive perceptions and experiences of partnerships. They also indicated an understanding of quality education. The participants further described and expressed positive strategies for establishing and maintaining partnerships. Despite some challenges associated with the partnerships, participants indicated some benefits of partnerships such as the provision of much-needed resources; intellectual-, emotional- and career development; improved quality education and academic performance; and better curriculum delivery. The participants expressed willingness to attend a professional development course on partnerships. The study concludes that school management practices in establishing and maintaining partnerships are critical for providing much-needed human- and material resources, especially to the poorly resourced township secondary schools. Schools managers and leaders need to develop a plan that incorporates community...
Ph.D.