School based factors influencing headteachers' adoption of Information and Communication Technology in administration of Secondary schools in Makadara District, Kenya

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to assess the school-based factors influencing adoption of ICT in administration of public secondary schools in Makadara district, Kenya, specifically to establish the availability of ICT resources for use in administration, assess the attitudes of school administrators towards adoption of ICT, determine the availablity of ICT technical support to help in the use of ICT,and to establish the leT skills use in the administration of public secondary schools in Makadara district.

The study was guided by Hammer & Champy's theory of business processes reengineering. The study targeted all the 10 public secondary schools in Makadara district with a population of 10 headteachers, 10 deputy headteachers and 80 heads of departments. A sample of 100 respondents was selected purposively. A response rate of 61 % achieved.

Descriptive survey research design was adopted as it brings out quantifiable information from the sample. Three sets of questionnaires were developed and administered to headteachers, deputy headteachers and heads of departments respectively. To determine the validity, the instrument was pretested in one school with one headteacher and five teachers. Data was analyzed quantitatively by the use of Statistical Package for Social Scientists computer program.

The findings show that the school administrators had very few computers for administration work in the district. The computers were used for capturing school enrolment, storage of student bio data, registration ofKCSE candidates, data entry on students' marks, analysis of student's results, typing examinations, accessing the internet, and for research on the subjects they taught. All the schools administarors in the district were computer literate.

Most of the schools had plans in place to upgrade ICT skills of their administrators. Only one third of the schools in the district had school management systems and only one school had a web enabled system. Most of the schools either used manual records or selected computer programmes including Microsoft's Word, Excel, and EmaillInternet to perform their duties.

Procurement for ICT equipment and servicing of computers in schools within the district was not advised by computer experts. Only a few of administrators had a good proficiency of computers suggesting that majority of them were only average users. Challenges faced by the head teachers when using ICT in administration included breakdown of computers, lack of technical support on the acquisition usage and maintenance of the computers, inadequate finances to procure computers, low Computer literacy levels among the administrators, and regular Power breakdowns in the district were the key challenges in the usage of lCT.

The study recommended that the Ministry of Education should encourage the adoption of ICT in administration in schools in the district through provision of computers to schools, ICT skills courses relevant to administration work, and ICT technical support to advice head teachers on procurement, usage and maintenance of computers.