| dc.description.abstract | Donor funded projects are of great interests to the government, civil society organizations and
the beneficiaries. Among other projects, education based projects are among the highly funded
projects by both the government and donors. Major management gaps exist in effective
implementation of such projects. This study therefore sought to investigate the extent to which
project management practices influence implementation of donor funded education projects in
Kajiado County. The study sought to establish the role of strategic planning, monitoring and
evaluation, use of technology, and stakeholder participation and how they influence
implementation of donor funded education projects in Kajiado County. The researcher surveyed
55 organizations that implement donor funded education projects. The respondents were
purposively selected from the levels of Executive Directors, Project Managers and Program
Officers who are the main custodians of information of their organizations. The researcher used a
questionnaire to collect primary data from the population and secondary data was collected from
the Government reports and other related studies. The questionnaire was piloted first to
determine instrument reliability and self-administered. The questionnaire consisted both closed
and open ended questions. After collection, the data was edited, coded and classified; the data
was analyzed using descriptive statistics and some level of inferential statistics which helped
interpret the correlation of the IV to the DV. The information collected was handled with utmost
confidentiality. From multiple regression (Y= 1.147+ 0.752X1+ 0.487X2+ 0.545X3+ 0.439X4), it
was inferred that strategic planning contributes most to the implementation of donor funded
education projects followed by M&E, use of technology and then stakeholder participation. The
study concluded that strategic planning ensures the project team and other stakeholders work
toward common goals, establishes agreement around intended outcomes/results. Most
organizations follow monitoring plan in most cases and that they provided feedback to the
beneficiaries after M&E. The most common ICT equipments and infrastructure used in
managing projects was computers. The study concluded that the key stakeholders in the project
are teachers and that stakeholders are involved in project implementation during brainstorming
on project ideas. The study recommends sensitization of the community to understand the need
for project planning, monitoring and implementation at all levels and that M&E should be
undertaken in entire project management cycle. Organizations invest more to enhance use of
technology while ensuring adequate training to all personnel which will significantly contribute
to the implementation of the donor funded education projects. | en_US |
