Accredited Programmes

Legislative Framework for School Governance (US ID 260257)

Learners will acqire and demonstrate knowledge and understanding of identifying and applying relevant legislation in relation to school governance. This module is about the Legislative Framework for School Governance. It discusses the importance of the Constitution, particularly the Constitutional Values and Bill of Rights, in determining the kind of legislation developed for schooling and school governance. It then discusses aspects of the SASA as amended, in terms of providing the learner with an overview of the Act and then focuses in detail on the aspects pertaining to school governance in the Act. Finally, it identifies other Acts and White Papers that support the SASA and deepen the learner's insight into school governance. The module is based entirely on the Unit Standard entitled " Demonstrate knowledge of the legislative Framework for School Governance" (ID 260257). This Unit Standard is registered on the National Qualification Framework and carries 10 credits. An SGB member who achieves the credits will receive a nationally recognised certificate of competence and his/her credits will be recorded on the National Learner Record Database (NLRD).

Develop and Implement Policy for School Governance (US ID 260337)

This programme is packed with theoretical and practical processes of Policy Formulation, Implementation as well as Monitoring and Evaluation of the Policy

School Governance also involves either both the review of existing and the development of new policies. The new policies may either replace the existing policies or fill the gap where there was no policy. Policy formulation and implementation involve knowledge and skills of a mainly generic nature. Once acquired, they could be applied to a variety of contexts within the community, for example, a religious organisation, NGO etc.

Many SGBs do not perform optimally because they often do not know what to do in terms of their mandate or they lack the requisite skills to perform their functions as SGB members. It is hoped that this manual will provide sufficient guidance to SGB members to develop policies that will strenghthen the school and to monitor and evaluate its implementation.

The programme is packaged in such a way that it:

• Explains the principles of policy development in the context of a school.
• Discusses aspects related to policy formulation.
• Assists governors in formulating a policy.
• Develops an implementation plan for the policy.
• Monitors and evaluates the policy.

School Policies that each Governing Body should have are the following:

• Admission Policy
• Language Policy
• Religion Policy
• Learners' Code of Conduct

1. school infrastructure;
2. capacity of a school in respect of the number of learners a school can admit; and
3. the provision of learning and teaching support material

School Development Planning (US ID 260237)

Participants will acqire theoretical and practical knowledge of developing a plan to improve schools as well as implementing and monitoring School Development Planning (SDP).

All School Governing Bodies are requested to have a 3-5 year plan that focuses on the following 9 areas of the Whole School Evaluation:

1. Basic functionality of the school.
2. Leadership, management and communication.
3. Governance and relationships.
4. Quality of teaching and learning, and educator development.
5. Curriculum provision and resources.
6. School safety, security and discipline.
7. School infrastructure.
8. Parents and community.

Through a School Development Plan, the vision and mission of the School Governing Body is mapped out in the form of a strategic plan. The programme:

• Gives an overview of all systems that lead to the completion of School Development Plans.
• Articulates all processes that deal with school development planning with special reference to the nine Whole School Development areas.
• Summarises it into little fragments that will form part of the whole process, with the aim of coming up with a tool-kit.
• Assists schools with an environmental scan.
• Assists the schools in developing and implementing their plans.

Recruitment and Selection (US ID 10978)

This programme assists the participants to be able to plan and prepare for recruitment and selection processes and also to demonstrate understanding of Human Resource issues in terms of school governance.

The Recruitment and Selection Programme for SGB members is designed specfically for School Governance and its need was informed by the desire to develop capacity of SGB members participating in recruitment and selection processes to carry out such functions legally, professionally and with integrity.

Section 20 (i) states that the SGB recommend to the Head of Department the appointment of educators at the school. subject to the Employment of Educators' Act and the Labour Relations' Act.