Implication of guidance & counselling services management for student retention in Uganda's universal Secondary Education.

Abstract

The purpose of this multiple case study was to analyze the implication of the way Masaka City USE schools manage Students’ Support Services (SSS) and its implication for student retention. The first three objectives of the study were to examine the way USE schools manage; guidance and counseling, co-curricular, and school feeding services. The fourth objective was to determine the implication of the way the three SSS are managed for student retention. Management of SSS was benchmarked by Max Weber’s theory of bureaucracy, and student retention was benchmarked by Tinto’s model of student departure. As a qualitative study by approach, and a multiple case study by research design, the study was guided by the constructivism paradigm. The study was conducted in three USE schools located in Masaka City, and the respondents included; headteachers, teachers, heads of non-academic departments, students and dropouts. Data was collected using Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) from three headteachers, nine heads of guidance and counselling, welfare, and sports departments. Six dropouts, one boy and one girl, from each school were part of the KIIs. Nine Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) were conducted; three for teachers, three for male student, and three for female students in each school. Non-obtrusive observation was done to collect data from some of the observable school operations and structures. Findings revealed that that against all odds, the three schools try their best to provide guidance and counselling, cocurricular, and school feeding services to students. It was also established that management of guidance & counselling, co-curricular, and school feeding at the three USE schools was at the bare minimum due to a number of barriers that inhibit effective provision of the three support services. The key barriers identified were structural and logistical in nature. The structural barriers gravitated around the bureaucratic management of the three services that leads to a one size fits all approach to service provision. The logistical barriers were inadequate human, financial, infrastructure and time resources suffered by the three schools. It was also established that the way the three USE schools manage the three support services has far reaching implication for student retention. The study concludes that the way the three USE schools manage guidance & counselling, co-curricular, and school feeding services are managed leaves a lot to desire, given the entering behavior of the students that patronize the schools. Secondly, the way the three services are managed largely undermine student retention in the three schools. The study recommends that management at the three USE schools rethinks the one size fits all approach to the provision of student support services and adopt a more customized approach. Secondly, management at the three schools needs to devise innovative ways of mobilizing resources needed to support the provision of adequate services by diversifying their sources of revenue, sensitization of key stakeholders, involving students more in the management of these services, and building capacity the staff to provide the services more effectively and efficiently. Key Words: Management; Student Support Services; Student Retention; Implication; Universal Secondary Education Schools.