Community participation in basic school development at Sekyere central district of the Ashanti Region

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to investigate community participation in Basic School development at Sekyere Central District of Ashanti Region of Ghana. The objectives of the study were to access areas community leaders are involved in basic schools development, identify factors that impedes community participation in basic schools development and to find out measures to improve community participation in basic school development at Sekyere Central District. Descriptive research design using the quantitative approach was adopted for the study. The target population for the study was all School Management Committee executives, Parent Teacher Association executives at Beposo Circuit of the Sekyere Central District. The accessible population was 122 comprising 68 School Management Committee executives and 54 Parent Teacher Associations executives Purposive sampling technique was used to select all the 122 community leaders for the study. Questionnaire was used to collect data for the study. The reliability test yielded cronbach alpha of 0.82. The data were analysed using descriptive statistics, such as, frequencies and percentages. The study found that community leaders were involved in promoting access to education and repairing school facilities. Political interference and loss of interest in community participation impeded community participation. Scheduling of meetings at convenient times, clear roles and responsibilities of local community were measures to improve community participation development of basic schools. It is recommended that the Sekyere Central District Directorate of education should entreat heads of basic schools to adopt the measures that could help to improve community participation in the development of basic schools.