Challenges Facing School Administrators in Financial Management - Case Study Example

Challenges Facing School Administrators in Financial Management: A Case Study of Pulaski County Special School District Table of Contents Page 1. Introduction ………………………..………………………..……3 2. Problem Statement……………………….…………….…………4 3. Literature Review………………………….……..……….………5 4. Conclusions/Recommendations……………….……………….…7 5. References……………………………………..………………….9 Challenges Facing School Administrators in Financial Management: A Case Study of Pulaski County Special School District Introduction Pulaski County Special School District is one of the school districts in Arkansas. Since its establishment in 1927, it has been dedicated to providing K-12 education right from the elementary to high school levels. Currently, it has a total of 38 schools-24 elementary schools; 6 middle schools; 6 high schools; and 2 alternate learning centers. According to the official records from Arkansas Department of Education, the district currently has a total pupil and teacher population of 17,637 and 1,189 respectively. Under the management of Dr. Jerry Guess as the district superintendent of schools, the district has managed to maintain a high standard and provide exceptional education services that suit the immediate community. As public institutions, the schools from the district have been greatly dependent of public funding. Meaning, a large portion of their budgets is financed by the federal government. So, even if they might be getting some revenues from the direct services offered, local sources or donations and grants from well-wishers, they still rely on the federal government as the chief financier. It is only through the Department of Education that these schools acquire enough resources to cater for their academic and non-academic programs (Starr, 2014). Unlike private institutions, these public schools can not manage to support themselves. They need to seek the support of the government for them to get money to use in buying for school resources, feeding learners, giving allowances to their staffs and supporting their day to day activities. Since the funds are provided by the government, there is a need to account for them. It is wise to appropriately spend government funds and become accountable for them. This can be achieved through the outlining of budgeting process for the planning for, spending and accounting for the money. However, since the Department of Education has been advocating for the decentralization of the budgeting process, it has resorted into the use of site-based budget process. According to this approach, the budgeting process has been solely left in the hands of school administrators. Meaning, it is the school principals who are charged with the responsibility of budgeting for their respective schools and becoming accountable for their expenditures (Steve, 2008). However, this has proved to be a very challenging exercise. Most school administrators have found it extremely hard to run schools and be responsible for their financial expenditures. This paper researches on the challenges facing school principals in managing school resources. It reports that many schools within Pulaski Special School District have been unable to properly utilize their resources because of the inefficiencies of the site-based budgeting approach adopted in the district. It is a time consuming and tedious activity which requires a lot of financial training which most principals lack (Leithwood, Alma & Hopkins, 2008). Therefore, in order to address it, the paper recommends that most of these principals should be given adequate training on financial management to enable them discharge their duties without any inefficiencies experienced before. This can help in eliminating any misappropriation and mismanagement of school funds. Problem Statement As a matter of fact, all public schools heavily depend on government funding as the chief source of their revenue. However, since each school has different demands and priorities, it can be much better if they are allowed to be responsible for their budgeting. This has prompted the government, through the Department of Education, to decentralize the budget-making to the school levels. In other words, it is the school principals who are now directly in-charge of the drafting and enforcement of their respective school budgets. However, this has proved to be too challenging to most of them. Even thy might be experienced teachers, they have no or little training on financial management. Thus, there have been several cases of embezzlement of school funds. For this reason, the problem statement for this research is: how can the financial challenges facing school principals be solved? Based on the past records, many schools have not been able to properly utilize their resources because of the inefficiencies of the site-budget approach enforced on them. Even though it has been applauded as a brilliant idea, it has proved difficult for each school to be made accountable for their budgets (Sirkin, 2014). As administrators, school principals have no knowledge on budget making. At the same time, they have a lot of activities to perform (Hanushek & Alfred, 2010). Hence, they can not manage to make a good budget for their schools because it is a lengthy process that requires a lot of time. Moreover, a site-based budget making exercise can not be easily done as it requires the principal to involve all the school stakeholders a situation that might result into unnecessary conflicts amongst them. Literature Review According to Leithwood, K., Alma H. & Hopkins, D. (2008), financial management is one of the major aspects management that every institution should consider. Since no school can run without finances, it should be incumbent upon the administrators to be concerned about its use. For this reason, any school principal that is charged with the responsibility of overseeing the budgeting and use of school funds should be cautious to do it more diligently. As these scholars exclaim, even if the school administrators might be serious about academic success, they can not attain it without properly utilizing the resources at their disposal (Hasan, Monypenny & Murray, 2014). Actually, this has proved to be a very challenging undertaking that has made most schools be unable to effectively discharge their duties. According to a research conducted by the National Centre for Education Statistics (2014), cases of mismanagement of school funds are still on the rise. Many school administrators have been engaging in the misappropriation of school funds. Even if most schools complain of skewed and inadequate funding from the federal government, they still bear the greatest responsibilities. Their poor management habits have, in the long run, proved to be so costly. This is the similar scenario which has been experienced in most schools in Pulaski Special County School District (Sirkin, 2014). With the numerous challenges facing them, these schools still lack financial accountability. It is unfortunate to be in such a situation because most of the children especially those from the lower class families heavily rely on such funds for their education. These are the same sentiments emphasized by the Institute of International Education. In their 2011 report, it enumerated financial mismanagement as one of the major challenges facing public education sector in the country. With the high enrollment rates experienced in most schools today, all the available resources have become insufficient. Meaning, the little available resources should be properly utilized. This is the only way through which it can benefit the ordinary American children who solely depend on public education as a means of socio-economic mobility (Radin, 2006). According to the research, most school heads are not able to effectively teach, administer schools and fully account for the use of their funds. Further more, they are teachers who have not had enough training on budget making and financial management. According to her research, Rachel Fishman (2013) agrees with the assertion that the embezzlement of school funds is a crisis which has been ailing the education sector in the country. To her, a large percentage of school resources have been squandered by their respective administrators. She is right for making such an observation because many schools can not fully support their programs (Starr, 2014). . Even if the government, through the Department of Education, has given school managers a full authority to budge and spend their funds, many schools have not been able to account for their expenses. This has posed a major challenge both within and out of Pulaski Special County School District. To ultimately address the cases of financial misappropriation in public schools in the district, Sirkin, H. (2014) suggests that there is need to take appropriate measures. In his opinion, the best thing to do is to benchmark and borrow a leaf from those who have managed to successfully address it. It is a menace which should not be taken for granted, but should be dealt with as soon as possible. Otherwise, it can paralyze the education sector beyond no repair. Thus, he suggests that the school district should copy the right practices which have been applied by other states and nations which have managed to deal with it. This, in his opinion, will not only salvage school funds, but also help in promoting educational excellence within the school district. Conclusions and Recommendations In order to address the above challenges, this paper gives the following recommendations: First, the whole budgeting exercise should be re-thought. Even if it seems to be empowering teachers, it should only be managed by professionals. In other words, each school should recruit a professional accountant to be responsible for the budget making process. With their deeper understanding, they can help the school administrators and other stakeholders to draft a feasible budget which can help the institution to realize its goals. Besides, the Department of Education can organize to offer financial training to the school principals. If they are given adequate training, they can have the basic and fundamental skills required to make and monitor school budget. This, in the long run, can make them become accountable for the use of school funds (Hasan, Monypenny & Murray, 2014). Lastly, the paper recommends the imposition of stiffer penalties to the school administrators who are found to be engaged in the embezzlement of school resources. This will make them to act as examples to anyone who might be planning to commit the same offense in future. Conclusively, with the increased enrolment rates and high costs of production, many schools have found it so challenging to run their programs as planned. This has not been so because of inadequate funding, but due to the misuse of allocated resources. Even if the government has not increased the funds disbursed to public schools, the trending school site-based budgeting has proved to be inefficient. Although it decentralizes decision-making and budgeting autonomy to the school level, it has posed a great challenge to many schools within the district (Sirkin, 2014). Therefore, if all the above recommendations are applied, there will be no more misuse of school funds which are set aside to benefit the ordinary American children. References Hanushek, E.A. & A. Alfred (2010) Lindseth, Schoolhouses, Courthouses, and Statehouses: Solving the funding-achievement puzzle in Americas public schools (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Hasan, H., Monypenny, R. & Murray P. (2014) ‘Leadership styles and decision-making styles in an Indonesian school context.’ School Leadership & Management: Formerly School Organisation. Volume 34 Issue 3. pages 284-298. Leithwood, K., Alma H. & Hopkins, D. (2008) ‘Seven strong claims about successful school leadership.’ School Leadership & Management: Formerly School Organisation. Volume 28, Issue 1 Page 27-42. Radin, B. (2006) Challenging the Performance Movement: Accountability, Complexity, and Democratic Values. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press. Sirkin, H. (2014) ‘To Fix U.S. Public Education, Take a Lesson from Countries That Top Student Rankings’ Bloomberg Business Week. Retrieved From: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-02-04/to-fix-u-dot-s-dot-public-education-take-a-lesson-from-countries-that-top-student-rankings Starr, K. (2014) ‘Interrogating conceptions of leadership: school principals, policy and paradox.’ School Leadership & Management: Formerly School Organisation. Volume 34 Issue 3. Steve S. (April 16, 2008). Southern Education Foundation. "Crisis of a New Majority: Low-Income Students in the Souths Public Schools" Southern Spaces. 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