Innovative stakeholder engagement in rural secondary school: The impact on the learners’ performance and the quality of education

Abstract

The stakeholder engagement process entails schools soliciting information and ideas from various stakeholders for them to meaningfully contribute to the school’s success. The involvement of multiple stakeholders leads to effective school management (Bruns et al., 2011). The presence of stakeholders improves learner performance and educational quality. The stakeholders in the school are those who help the school achieve its goals and objectives, either directly or indirectly (Darrel et al., 2020). This paper seeks to investigate the extent to which rural secondary school principals engage stakeholders such as school governing bodies (SGBs), parents, community members, businesspeople, civic organizations, and teachers in novel ways to improve learners’ performance and educational quality. The quantitative descriptive case study method was employed. Using a simple random sampling method, 110 principals were selected from a population of 151 principals of secondary schools in the Vhembe district, Limpopo province, South Africa. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect data. The data was analyzed using descriptive statistical methods. The findings of the study revealed that principals involve some stakeholders in school activities, including SGBs, teachers, students, and parents. The study, however, found that principals are not engaging with stakeholders such as civic groups, businesspeople, non-governmental organizations, and alumnae. If principals want to reap the benefits of stakeholder engagement in schools, they should not be picky about who they invite to participate. Since education is a societal issue, they should take a comprehensive approach to stakeholder engagement.