Written by Dr Allistair Witten
Introduction
Improving the quality of education in South Africa’s public schools is one of the essential goals of the National Development Plan. Given the challenges faced by many schools in our country, it has become widely accepted that they will be unable to fully achieve their improvement goals on their own unless networks of support are built around the learners. Efforts from external stakeholders/partners to support the work of schools are thus commendable. However, many well-intentioned initiatives to support schools do not deliver on its intended outcomes due to difficulties that often arise during the course of the partnership. Many of these can be avoided if more attention is paid to laying the groundwork for an effective partnership before the actvities begin. In other words, organizations, groups, or individuals, in their eagerness to start the work/projects in schools, often forget to do the necessary due diligence work upfront that clarifies goals, roles, expectations, and outcomes for everyone involved in the partnership. In this brief, we clarify some of the concepts that define school partnerships and suggest some steps to follow in order to ensure its success in schools.
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