Practices and Challenges of Change Management in Government Primary Schools in Dawo Woreda
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Date
2023-05
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
This study was conducted in Dawoworeda, south west shoa zone, oromia regional state with the purpose of assessing the practices and challenges of change management in primary schools. The study was carried out in 9 (32%) primary school of study area which was selected by using simple random sampling especially lottery method and purposive. A total of 82 individuals (64 teachers and 18 school principals) were participated in the study.64 Teacher participants were selected proportionally and 9 school principals and 9 vice principals were selected purposively because of availability. The main instrument of data collection was questionnaire. Interview and document analysis were used in addition to the data collected by questionnaires. The data collected by questionnaires were analyzed by using frequency, percentage, mean and standard deviation. And also the data obtained by interview from school principals and vice principals were analyzed qualitatively. From the data collected and analyzed by questionnaires and interviews the emphasis given to perception of teachers ,preplanning process and also the emphasis given to develop implementation plan was low, there was less involvement of teachers and other stake holders in developing implementation plan of change. In addition the result of the study revealed that, schools were not allocated necessary resources to implement the introduced change, low attention were given to communication aspect of change, there is lack of giving training on the identified weaknesses and also school principals show low performance in providing continuous and timely feedback during implementation of change. Change implementation process faced challenges because of the reasons such as: fear of the unknown, loss of freedom, knowledge or skill gap and past habit experience. On the other hand the study recommends creating awareness and empowering the implementers of change in skills and knowledge, planning necessary resources for change, communicating changes has to accompanied in feedback, schools has to identify area of weakness and strength in the implementation process of changes, and involving teachers in planning process of change, making open and regular discussion and rewarding those teachers who best implement the changes.