REINFORCEMENT OF COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION IN EDUCATION MANAGEMENT: A CASE IN SUPHANBURI PROVINCE

Abstract

This qualitative research firstly aims to study the present situations and problems of community participation in education management in Suphanburi province. Secondly to capture lessons-learned from an achievement of prototype school in promoting community participation in education. And finally, to propose some guidelines to promote ‘community participation in education’ in the area. Target populations are education stakeholder consisting of school board committee, school directors, teachers, parents, and people in the research area. Data was collected by using in-depth interview and focus group discussion and was analyzed by technique of content analysis and constant comparison. The results found that the studied schools’ committee scarcely involved in education management because of their limited knowledge in education management and restriction in recruitment process. Based on the experience from prototype school; actual and sustain participation of the community could significantly encourage school committee to discover the education goals and principles of education management and allowed them to perform more effectively. Ultimately, the recommendations derived from the research are 1) Establish the awareness of responsibility on education within each community 2) Promote experiential learning to build up the competency in team-working 3) Adopt participation approach to be carried out in the entire process 4) Sustain the continuity in co-working or collaboration and 5) Develop the competencies and traits of the institutes’ administrators to be compatible with participatory approach.