PRINCIPALS’ ROLE IN PROMOTING USE AND INTEGRATION OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN WARENG SUB-COUNTY, KENYA

Abstract

The emergence of Information and Communication Technologies and knowledge economies has ushered in a paradigm shift in education. Traditional paperwork is being overtaken by electronic devices as the standard working tools in educational institutions. The need to assess the role of public secondary school principals in promoting the use and institutionalization of ICTs for teaching, learning and school management has become increasingly necessary. Principals now manage technology-mediated institutions, digital information and virtual interactions. Teachers are becoming facilitators fostering lifelong learning and equipping learners to look for information on their own. This study investigated the extent of use of ICT resources, principals’ role, challenges and strategies they employ. A mixed methods research was carried which concurrently integrated cross sectional survey and phenomenology designs. Probability and non probability sampling procedures were used. Sampling yielded 15 schools and 109 participants comprising 15 principals, 30 heads of departments, 60 teachers and 4 education officials. Data was collected using questionnaires, interview guides and observation schedules. Pilot testing was carried out on 6 principals, 8 HoDs and 10 teachers and the findings used to determine the validity, reliability and improvement of research instruments. The questionnaires for principals, HoDs and teachers’ yielded an overall Cronbach’s alpha reliability index of 0.756. Quantitative data was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20 and presented using frequencies, means, percentages, tables and pie charts. Qualitative data was analyzed and categorized into themes and presented in form of narratives and direct quotes. Most public secondary schools in Wareng Sub-County had basic ICT hardware and software resources which were mainly distributed and frequently used for school management tasks and computer studies subject unlike for other subjects’ teaching and learning. Plans existed in schools, mainly to build ICT physical and human infrastructure. There was low availability of ICT schedules. Most schools had no incentives to motivate teachers and learners to use computers. Majority of principals hardly used computers making them weak examples to the rest of the school community. Some written rules existed mainly for computer laboratories but the unwritten rules existed which brought many controls thus limiting the distribution, access and efficient uses of available ICT resources. Challenges included low ICT literacy levels among teachers and students, weak schools’ ICT policies and absence of clarified roles for principals, technophobia, inadequate computer studies teachers and principals’ low levels of ICT skills limiting their ability to supervise effective and efficient use of ICT resources. Principals should mobilize parents and other alternative sources for ICT funds, develop school ICT policies, require and facilitate each teacher to procure a laptop and make computer studies compulsory in form 1 and 2. The study recommends that the Ministry of Education should specify ICT roles for public secondary school principals in the use of available ICT resources for teaching, learning and school management. Computer donations should be distributed to poorer schools and to other key sections in schools such as staffrooms. The MoE should formulate a policy requiring every teacher to procure a laptop.